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Donald Trump in front of the White House: New lockdowns "under no circumstances"
Photo: CARLOS BARRIA / REUTERS
Donald Trump made his first statement on the "Operation Warp Speed" vaccine project after his defeat in the US presidential election.
The US President apparently claims the latest successes in the development of a vaccine by the German company Biontech and the Pfizer group for his government program.
The head of vaccine development at Pfizer, Kathrin Jansen, had recently distanced herself from "Operation Warp Speed" in relation to the "New York Times".
"We were never a part of Warp Speed," she said, according to the newspaper.
There was no money from the US government.
A company spokeswoman later announced, however, that they were participating in the program as part of the vaccine delivery.
Trump, on the other hand, stated that heads of state from abroad had already called and thanked the United States for the performance.
It was an unfortunate misunderstanding that Pfizer initially did not associate the recent success in developing a vaccine with "Operation Warp Speed".
Biontech, which cooperates with the pharmaceutical company Pfizer, announced a promising interim result from a corona vaccine study this week.
Accordingly, the vaccine from Biontech and Pfizer prevents at least 90 percent of Covid-19 diseases.
That would be an extremely good value.
New York should go away empty-handed
According to the US President, millions of doses of the vaccine are already available.
You just have to wait for approval by the authorities.
First of all, particularly vulnerable population groups are to be supplied, and the vaccine is to be available for the entire population in April, said Trump.
The US government has already contractually secured the delivery of 100 million vaccine doses and has the option of receiving millions more doses quickly.
The state of New York should not be taken into account initially.
The Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo does not trust the government in Washington and wants to examine the drug separately.
"So we won't deliver it to New York until we have permission," said Trump.
The incumbent US president indirectly criticized Cuomo for his announcement a few weeks ago that an approved vaccine would be checked for safety by its own experts.
Cuomo had justified this with concerns that Trump could use a fund for political purposes and distribute it prematurely to the population.
New lockdowns "under no circumstances"
With regard to the further strategy in the corona pandemic, Trump said there would be no new lockdowns under his administration.
His administration will "under no circumstances" decide on new restrictions, said Trump.
The elected US President Joe Biden recently called for urgent government action against the accelerated spread of the corona pandemic.
After meeting with his own panel of experts, Biden said Friday that the facts presented by the medical professionals were alarming.
The crisis requires an immediate, determined response from the Washington government, Biden said.
Unfortunately, this does not yet exist.
"I am the elected President, but I will not be President until next year," said Biden, with a view to taking office on January 20.
"The crisis did not respect any dates in the calendar, it is now accelerating."
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