Dr. Anthony Fauci recently said that Israel would have been the best place to be for COVID-19 vaccines early in the pandemic.
Fauci spoke with Israeli vaccine expert professor Jonathan Gershoni in a video interview earlier this week about the COVID-19 vaccine rollout, according to The Times of Israel.
When asked if Israel was the guinea pigs for the vaccine, Fauci said the opposite was true.
- “I look at it exactly the opposite. I think Israel was really lucky they got their implementation done so quickly and so effectively, not only with initial vaccine but also with the booster program,” he said, according to The Times of Israel.
Fauci said Israel has seen a lot of success with the vaccine. He said he hopes the U.S. will follow in its footsteps, The Times of Israel reports.
- “Often, when I push to get our booster program going I refer back to how successful the Israelis have been in getting virtually every age group boostered,” Fauci said.
Fauci may want to give some credit to the U.S., though. The U.S. COVID-19 vaccine rollout — done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — was near perfect compared to 17.5 million other potential rollout strategies, according to The Conversation.
- To find this, The Conversation teamed with an Iowa State University supercomputer to compare rollout methods.
- “According to our model, the CDC’s decisions to not vaccinate children initially and prioritize health care and other essential workers over nonessential workers were both correct. But our model also showed that giving individuals with known risk factors earlier access to vaccines would have led to slightly better outcomes,” according to The Conversation.
The United States will look to continue the rollout success with the COVID-19 booster shot. More than 196 million people have been fully vaccinated again COVID-19, and 36.1 million have received their first booster dose, according to the CDC.