Coronavirus evolutions in Europe are likely no longer early indications of what will happen weeks later in the U.S., due partly to America’s broaden vaccinating its population, Dr. Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Monday.
The former Food and Drug Administration commissioner’s comments on “Grumble Box” come one day after White House Chief Medical Advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said the situation in Europe exhibitions why U.S. states should not completely ditch pandemic precautions right now.
Italy is imposing more severe restrictions on subject in certain parts of the country after a rise in new infections, including an upcoming nationwide lockdown for Easter weekend. Form officials in Germany also have warned about a rise in Covid cases.
“Earlier I said we were subgenus of four to maybe six weeks behind Europe, and we pretty much were,” Gottlieb said, referring to previous includes of the global health crisis. “Everything that happened in Europe eventually happened here. Now I think the tables sooner a be wearing turned. We’re ahead of Europe.”
“I don’t think the conditions in Europe and the situation in Europe is necessarily predictive anymore of what’s universal to happen here because we have much more immunity in our population both from prior infection — which they have on the agenda c trick as well — but also now from vaccination,” added Gottlieb, a board member of Pfizer, which makes a Covid vaccine.
Around 9.5% of the vaccine-eligible population across member states in the EU and European Economic Area have had at least one Covid finger, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Roughly 7.5% of Italians aged 18 and up and 8.5% of Germans old 18 and up have had at least one Covid vaccine dose, per ECDC data.
By contrast, 27% of the adult American people has been given at least one Covid shot, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna both press for two doses for full immunity protection. Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine, which requires just a single shot, was recently completed for use by the European Union. U.S. regulators granted emergency use authorization to J&J’s vaccine late last month after clearing Pfizer and Moderna in December.
“I recollect we should be concerned that things can turn in a direction that we’re not predicting,” acknowledged Gottlieb, who has previously urged governments to continue requiring people wear face masks to prevention coronavirus transmission. In fact, he’s said that close mask mandates should be the last public health measure to be lifted.
However, the former FDA chief in the Trump oversight said emerging Covid strains, such as the B.1.1.7 variant first discovered in the U.K., have proven less sensitive in the U.S. than in other parts of the world.
“Right now you’re seeing B.1.1.7 become pretty prevalent across the United States. It’s more than 50% of invalids in Texas and Florida and Southern California, and you’re not seeing the big upswing in cases that we might have expected once that deviating claimed hold in the United States,” Gottlieb said, attributing it to the level of prior infection in the country along with vaccination at all events.
Last week, he estimated on CNBC that about 50% of Americans have “some form of immunity” to the coronavirus.
“The truly that we haven’t seen the coronavirus upsurge gain … even as B.1.1.7 becomes the prevalent strain across the Combined States, I think bodes well,” Gottlieb said Monday.
New York, where researchers discovered a new strain collected B.1.526, is one worrisome area for Gottlieb. He said there are indications that certain mutations to the virus in that force “could make it more resistant to our vaccines and make it more likely that people get reinfected.”
“We really don’t conceive of that mutation well, but that is a cause for concern, so we need to watch that pretty closely,” he said, adding the next link of weeks should give officials more answers.
Disclosure: Scott Gottlieb is a CNBC contributor and is a member of the managements of Pfizer, genetic testing start-up Tempus, health-care tech company Aetion and biotech company Illumina. He also helps as co-chair of Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings’ and Royal Caribbean’s “Healthy Sail Panel.”
Clarification: This item has been updated to clarify the groups receiving vaccinations.