Operation Warp(ed) Speed

Before Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine was proved highly successful in clinical trials last month, the company offered the Trump administration the chance to lock in supplies beyond the 100 million doses the pharmaceutical maker agreed to sell the government as part of a $1.95 billion deal months ago.

But the administration, according to people familiar with the talks, never made the deal, a choice that now raises questions about whether the United States allowed other countries to take its place in line.

[...]

The government was in July given the option to request 100 million to 500 million additional doses. But despite repeated warnings from Pfizer officials that demand could vastly outstrip supply and amid urges to pre-order more doses, the Trump administration turned down the offer, according to several people familiar with the discussions.

  NYT

Art of the deal. I guess the My Pillow guy had convinced Trump hydroxychloroquine was going to take care of the problem.

As the administration scrambles to try to purchase more doses of the vaccine, President Trump plans on Tuesday to issue an executive order that proclaims that other nations will not get the U.S. supplies of its vaccine until Americans have been inoculated.

Wow. Pretending he secured more than enough, while at the same time implying he didn't, because he needs to make a proclamation that Americans get America's doses first? That'll be part of his 2024 campaign: he secured America's doses for Americans.

But the order appears to have no real teeth and does not expand the U.S. supply of doses.

Yes, we got that.

The vaccine being produced by Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, is a two-dose treatment, meaning that 100 million doses is enough to vaccinate only 50 million Americans.

[...]

On Nov. 11 — two days after Pfizer first announced early results indicating that its vaccine was more than 90 percent effective — the European Union announced that it had finalized a supply deal with Pfizer and BioNTech for 200 million doses, a deal they began negotiating in months earlier. Shipments could begin by the end of the year, and the contract includes an option for 100 million more doses.

[...]

The United States has declined to participate in a global initiative, called Covax, that is meant to make a vaccine available globally.

Redundant.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.