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In light of the dramatic spread of the corona virus in the United States, future US President Joe Biden wants to significantly accelerate the pace of corona vaccinations in the country.
Biden announced on Friday in Wilmington, Delaware, a bundle of actions aimed at overcoming existing problems and delays in the vaccination campaign in the United States.
Among other things, the US disaster control agency Fema is supposed to help set up vaccination centers.
Mobile vaccination stations are to be sent to remote areas.
Biden also wants to use the pharmacies in the country to also give vaccinations.
In addition, the democrat wants to ensure that other population groups are already vaccinated and the current prioritization is relaxed.
Worldwide, the number of people who have died after a corona infection has only just passed the two million mark.
More than 93 million infections have been reported around the globe so far.
In absolute terms, the United States is the country hardest hit by the pandemic.
In the United States of around 330 million people, more than 23 million infections with the virus have been registered so far.
More than 390,000 people have already died from the virus.
The number of deaths reported within a day broke new records recently - last Tuesday it was more than 4,400.
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Biden called the numbers devastating.
"We are still in a very dark winter," he warned.
“We are at war with this virus.” Among other things, the Democrat has declared a goal of at least 100 million vaccine doses being administered within the first 100 days after taking office.
He will be sworn in as president next Wednesday.
So far, vaccinations in the USA are making slow progress.
According to the US government on Friday, more than 30 million vaccine doses have been distributed in the country to date.
According to a list by the “New York Times”, however, only a good twelve million vaccine doses have been administered so far.
On Friday, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio and Oregon State Governor Kate Brown complained about the vaccine distribution.
De Blasio wrote on Twitter that New York will run out of vaccines in the coming week, while other parts of the country have unused vaccine doses.
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Biden also said: "There are tens of millions of vaccine doses that are unused in freezers, while people who want and need the vaccine cannot get it." That must change urgently.
Biden's future government wants to encourage all states to offer vaccinations faster to larger populations.
In the USA, similar to Germany, a list of priorities has been drawn up so that particularly vulnerable groups are vaccinated first.
However, Biden complained that the implementation was too strict and confusing.
He advocated not only giving priority to health care workers, residents and employees in nursing homes, but also offering large numbers of vaccinations for other high-risk professional groups and citizens over 65 years of age.
The democrat also announced, among other things, that his government wanted to launch a large-scale awareness campaign to build trust in the vaccines among the population.
So far there has been great skepticism here.
Biden emphasized that Congress had to release money for his plans.
On Thursday he presented his plans for another trillion-dollar Corona aid package, in which billions of dollars are also earmarked for the immediate fight against the pandemic - including for a vaccination program and a significant expansion of the Corona test capacities.
The Democratic chairman of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, said on Friday support for the vaccination plans: The chamber is ready to work with the new government to implement the project immediately.
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Biden urged them to hurry and at the same time agreed to the aggravation of the situation.
"Things will get worse before they get better."
The latest warning from the US health authority CDC is also of concern, according to which the corona mutation, which was first discovered in Great Britain and is probably much more contagious, could soon be more widespread in the United States than the original variant.
"The predicted development of this variant in the USA shows rapid growth in early 2021 and will become the predominant variant in March," said the CDC on Friday.
This could further strain the medical infrastructure in the United States.