The Trump administration is organizing a program, dubbed “Operation Warp Speed,” intended to pull together private pharmaceutical companies, government agencies and the military to try to cut the development time for a vaccine by as much as eight months — but details are scarce.
According to Bloomberg, citing an administration official, the project’s goal is to have 300 million doses of vaccine available by January. Dr. Fauci, part of the team that Trump has said he himself will lead, says this timeline is possible — but it is not clear that he is directly commenting on Operation Warp Speed. Details on the project have not been made available.
The program is being unofficially likened to a “Manhattan Project-style effort” despite various experts, such as Dr. Peter Hotez, warning against using a certain type of messaging when talking about how quickly a COVID-19 vaccine will be made for distribution. Considering our nation's large anti-vaccine movement, Dr. Hotez is worried that project labels comparing the vaccine push to American-led effort to develop an atomic weapon during World War II will cause concerns over safety.
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