Q&A of the Day – Will the Biden administration expedite vaccines to Florida? Part 1
Each day I feature a listener question sent by one of these methods.
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Today’s entry: I’m trying to figure out what’s media hype for Biden from reality. Is it true that Biden’s orders will help get more vaccines to people quicker? And what specifically about Florida? Thanks.
Bottom Line: Within President Biden’s first few days he signed numerous executive orders. With each of those orders news media accounts often reported the intent of each order without regard to the realities on the ground. This included executive actions which in theory would expedite vaccine rollouts across the country. Take for example an Associated Press story from Saturday entitled: Joe Biden’s early approach to the Virus: Under promise and Overdeliver. That’s about par for the course for the reporting these days. It stands in just a slight contrast to the daily reporting regarding President Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force doesn’t it? Anyway, here is in theory, what will occur under Biden’s new plans via executive actions he’s signed:
- Addition of federally backed "Community vaccination centers” across the country
- Mobile units for rural and underserved communities
- No consideration for immigration status
Those three initiatives, should they come to fruition, do represent changes over the Trump-era policy. But before looking more closely at what those changes could bring let’s start with premise of what can be done starting with...how many vaccines are available.
By now you’ve heard President Biden’s articulated goal of immunizing 100 million Americans within his first 100 days in office. I’ll ask you two questions. What was President Trump’s articulated goal and how many vaccines have been administered daily prior to the Biden administration executive actions? President Trump’s stated goal for the first quarter of this year was to reach 1 million vaccinations per day. If you’re quick with math you might have just realized something. President Biden’s stated goal of 100 million vaccinations in his first 100 days is literally no different than President Trump’s goal of 1 million per day. It’s just being articulated differently. And why? That comes back to how many vaccines are available. As for the answer to the second question... On President Trump’s last day in office the United State administered 984,000 vaccines. In other words, the Trump administration had already achieved the goal by the time Biden came into power. And that’s where I’ll pick up in the second part of today’s Q&A.
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