because the Americans will be served first

Days pass and the good results of clinical trials follow one another, and even compete with each other, to fight Covid-19. After Pfizer / BioNtech’s candidate vaccine, which showed an efficiency of 90%, then the Russian project Gamaleïa, at 92%, on Monday it was the American company Moderna that communicated with an even better rate: 94.5% . Several effective vaccines will allow for massive international deployment, but Americans should still be served first.

Pfizer and BioNTech will market 50 million doses by the end of the year, vaccines reserved for American caregivers and the elderly. For its part, Moderna claims to be able to produce 20 million doses by the end of 2020, again only for the foreign market. And it is only at the beginning of 2021 that the other countries will be served.

90 million doses guaranteed by France

In France, the government has already secured 90 million doses. Knowing that two are needed per vaccinated person, 45 million French people could receive the double injection as early as next year. With an order of priority explained by Morgane Bomsel, vaccine specialist at the CNRS. “It seems that you want to start by vaccinating people at risk, be they elderly or with comorbidities, then the nursing staff,” he explains.

There are about 23 million vulnerable people in France, in addition to the 2.8 million health workers: it would therefore already require more than 51 million doses, at the rate of two per person. A giant vaccination campaign that would protect the most vulnerable people and take a big step towards collective immunity.