FDA authorizes first COVID-19 vaccine in US
A nurse in Belfast prepares a dose of the vaccine. | Photo by Liam McBurney / PA Images via Getty Images The Food and Drug Administration has authorized the use of a COVID-19 vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech, a landmark moment in the fight to suppress a virus that has killed nearly 300,000 people in the United States and sickened tens of millions around the world.
Today's emergency use authorization of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine holds the promise to alter the course of this pandemic in the United States," Peter Marks, director of the FDA's Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said in a press release.
The vaccine is authorized in the US for people over the age of 16. It was found to be 95 percent effective at preventing symptomatic COVID-19 in clinical trials. That is extraordinary," Anthony Fauci, director of...