A panel of advisers to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday (December 1) voted 13-to-1 to recommend that healthcare workers and residents of long-term care facilities should be first in line to receive initial doses of COVID-19 vaccines when they become available.
Bryan Wood reports.
A U.S. advisory panel says the first doses of a COVID-19 vaccine should be given to healthcare workers and residents of long-term care facilities.
The Advisory Panel on Immunization Practices advises the Centers for Disease Control and voted on Tuesday that with initial doses expected to be scarce, frontline health workers are a top priority.
Officials at the CDC say they expect only 5 to 10 million doses will be available per week once U.S. regulators authorize them, possibly later this month.
As for long-term care residents, the CDC says they make up just 6% of all COVID-19 cases but nearly 40% of related deaths.
However, several panel members were initially hesitant people in long-term care as neither the Moderna nor Pfizer vaccines, currently being reviewed for emergency use, were specifically tested on that group.
But, they ultimately endorsed the decision and consent forms will be provided to people so that they know the potential risks.
State and local health officials will use the panel's recommendations to guide their decision making about how to dole out the vaccines, and may have to prioritise healthcare workers with direct patient contact or who handle infectious materials.
Ultimately, the CDC expects to have as many as 40 million doses of the two-dose vaccines available by the end of the year, which would cover roughly 20 million people
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