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Pfizer's (NYSE: PFE) Covid-19 vaccine is presently only approved for
emergency use in the United States, but full clearance by the US Food and Drug Administration
might come as soon as next week.
The consequences might change the path of the pandemic in a
variety of ways.
For starters, complete approval of a Covid-19 vaccine may
encourage more individuals to be vaccinated as more than 30% of the eligible
population in the United States has yet to receive a vaccination.
"People are going to see full approval, and they are
going to feel much more confident in taking the vaccine," said Dr. RobertMurphy, executive director for the Institute of Global Health at Northwestern
University's Feinberg School of Medicine, NBC reported.
Murphy said that part of the skepticism about vaccination
with just emergency use permission stems from a misunderstanding of what that
sort of authorization entails.
Clinical trial data
"It does not mean it's experimental. All the
experimental work has been done," he said.
Covid-19 vaccine manufacturers submitted roughly three
months of clinical trial data to qualify for emergency use authorization. This
included at least two months of safety data on fully vaccinated subjects since
most vaccine adverse effects emerge between two- and three months following
immunization.
For some Americans, it isn't enough evidence to persuade
them to receive the vaccine.
Full approval of a Covid-19 vaccine needs considerably more
evidence, including real-world safety and effectiveness data obtained outside
of a clinical study. The CDC has been collecting real-world statistics on the
vaccinations, and over 165 million people in the United States have already
been immunized against the virus, CNN reported.
Vaccine safety
The additional information may help persuade more
individuals that vaccinations are safe.
According to The Associated Press, the Biden administration
has stated that the federal government would not require immunizations beyond
the federal workforce, but White House officials have urged state and local
governments and companies to pursue vaccine mandates.
Several companies, including Disney (NYSE: DIS), Facebook (NASDAQ: FB), Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL),
Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), Tyson Foods (NYSE: TSN), United Airlines (NASDAQ: UAL), and Walmart (NYSE: WMT), have announced
vaccination mandates for employees. Indiana University will require students
and workers to be vaccinated against COVID-19, while other universities are
awaiting final FDA approval before implementing a mandate.
According to Anthony Fauci, who also serves as President Joe
Biden’s chief medical adviser said final FDA approval will result in a
"flood" of vaccination requirements across the country.
Unvaccinated people
If more people are vaccinated, the pandemic might be over
this year. However, he is concerned that if too many individuals stay
unvaccinated, outbreaks of illness would persist in the long run.
“You will get a smoldering level of infection that will just
go right into the fall, get confused with influenza in the winter, and then
come back again in the spring,” he told USA Today.
Unvaccinated people will continue to become sick, and some
will die, according to Fauci. As more people become infected with the
infectious Delta variant, the likelihood of an even more complicated and
deadly mutation arising grows.
According to a Kaiser Family Foundation poll, three out of
every ten unvaccinated individuals indicated they would be more inclined to be
vaccinated if one of the vaccines received full clearance.
However, Kaiser noted that several of those polled were
confused about the shots. Two-thirds believed the vaccinations already had
complete approval or were doubtful. This discovery might simply suggest that
complete approval "is a proxy for general safety concerns."
With inputs from CNN
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