President Joe Biden said Thursday that the U.S. had bought an additional 200 million doses of the coronavirus vaccine and unveiled when the country will have them ready to go, according to NPR.
What’s going on?
Biden spoke at the National Institutes of Health on Thursday saying the U.S. had bought the additional 200 million doses, ballooning the entire country’s supply to 600 million doses.
- “We’ve now purchased enough vaccine supplies to vaccinate all Americans,” Biden said. “Now we’re working to get those vaccines into the arms of millions of people.”
He said the country has secured enough doses from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech to have vaccines for every American by the end of July.
When will they be available?
Biden said that Pfizer and Moderna will increase the delivery time of these vaccines from June to May, per NPR.
- “That’s a month faster,” Biden said. “That means lives will be saved.”
Per The Hill, “The extra doses will not be immediately available, meaning that the existing supply shortages plaguing the rollout are likely to continue, at least in the short term.”
- This doesn’t include other vaccine companies — such as Johnson & Johnson or AstraZeneca — releasing their vaccines.
Bigger picture
So far, there have been 48 million doses administered throughout the U.S. with 1.62 million doses administered per day, according to Bloomberg.
One more thing...
Utah has backed a similar plan that would have all Utah adults vaccinated by May, according to the Deseret News.