Date: 3/31/2021
The Reminder editor revises history when he claims, “We started the process with not enough vaccine and we can lay the blame for that on the doorstep of the previous presidential administration.”
Actually, we all owe a huge debt of gratitude to the previous administration that we have ANY vaccine at all. All the experts jeered at President Trump when he promised to get a vaccine developed by the end of the year. They said that was impossible; developing a new vaccine takes years, and if he did they wouldn’t trust it anyway. Well, Operation Warp Speed delivered the vaccine. Due to political pressure, Pfizer did not file for approval until the day after the election, or it might have been approved even sooner. Vaccinations began in December 2020. But all-consuming hatred of Donald J. Trump allows people to forget this ever happened.
And the story doesn’t stop there. The administration also took a huge gamble and contracted with both Pfizer and Moderna to purchase many millions of doses well before the vaccine was even tested, so that if they tested out all right, the doses would be manufactured and ready to ship. That is why we were able to begin vaccinating in December. The international news is full of stories that the European Union did not gamble, and only started to order once the vaccines were approved, and so they are now well behind the US in vaccinations.
I can sympathize with The Reminder’s editor about how difficult it is to get an appointment for the vaccine. But he should be reminded that is a state issue, not a federal issue, and without President Trump’s daring actions, nobody would be expecting to get a vaccine until 2022.
R. Patrick Henry
East Longmeadow
