Something that may have been missed in the reporting about today's hearing with Fauci and friends.

[onecaliberal]

Senator Sanders asked Dr. Stephen M. Hahn if Americans would have access to the COVID vaccine free of charge. The reply was the payment of vaccine is not the responsibility of the FDA, but that he would take the concern back to the task force. I can't help but wonder how this is all going to roll out.

Why does it seem republicans are always doing the exact opposite of best practice?

We need an essential workers bill of rights now. Republicans think the front line workers are expendable. Many are poor, black, brown and female. We are already losing these people at a much higher rate.

What is the value of a human life?

[hlthe2b]

1. The ignorance of even the most basic public health principles-- that most lay people can readily

understand-- among these Republicans just baffles me. The so-called physicians among them are no better.

It is NOT hard to understand that the success of a mass vaccination program to control and ultimately eradicate a highly infectious disease is dependent on reaching nearly EVERYONE--ultimately worldwide. Not just the rich. The 1% are no safer ultimately until society is very widely immune.

How they can be so ignorant of this basic principle or so wantonly stupid, escapes me.

[dhol82]

2. They are not ignorant.

Being greedy, manipulative, authoritarian pricks better suits their agenda.

[gratuitous]

3. I spotted that

After Dr. Hahn couldn't really give a satisfactory answer about the cost of any prospective vaccine, Sen. Sanders asked the other three witnesses if any of them cared to jump in with assurances that the vaccine wouldn't be priced prohibitively for the people most likely to be infected. Not a word from any of them. Let's see who patents the sun when a vaccine is formulated.

[barbtries]

4. clearly that depends on who you ask

in my ethic, every life is priceless. not so for republicans.

i can think of an exception or 2 actually. they're republicans and one is president. all they do is damage.

[KPN]

16. Well said.

[dawg day]

5. Yes, jobs must be protected

If we are going to need to test widely, the law has to protect workers from retaliation for testing positive.

[Hoyt]

6. Insurers, Medicare, etc., will pay. Plus trump has already committed to paying for

tests and treatment for uninsured. He’d have a hard time getting out of paying for vaccine.

FDA head as wrong person to ask.

[onecaliberal]

18. While they were testifying today about a national al testing strategy the trump admin announced

They are ending the testing in Dallas. I don’t know about you, but I simply do not believe they’re going to do what they’re saying with regard to the testing let alone tracking. Testing without tracking and isolating is pointless.

[stillcool]

7. the value of a human life today...

is not as much as an empty middle seat on a passenger plane.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

8. It's a $1,200 check with Trump's signature on it.

Beyond that, according to Republicans, you're on your own. Thanks for the votes, suckers!

[crickets]

9. Were mass vaccinations discussed at all?

I have a childhood recollection of every student being lined up in the hallway while a nurse with a smallpox vaccine gun went down the line grabbing arm after arm *bzzt* and after a couple of hours the entire school was vaccinated. Lather, rinse, repeat nationwide. Eventually, just about everyone in the US (and the world, thanks to the WHO) during the 1960s & early 1970s got a nifty scar on their upper left arm. It worked. Smallpox is gone.

If a good vaccine is developed, expecting people to trickle into doctor's offices and pay varying fees is silly. The only way to conquer this thing would be to line up everybody and give it a go, paid for with our taxes. This is one of those things taxes are for after all.

Anti-vaxxers can take their chances, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a fair number of them change their tune by the time (if ever) a successful vaccine rolls around.

[SharonAnn]

10. You are talking about polio vaccine. Smallpox was done much younger .

Smallpox Vaccine leaves a scar, not Polio vaccine.

[crickets]

15. Nope. I still have that scar from the smallpox vaccination I received in 1968.

I distinctly remember the "Jet injector" gun used to administer it.

https://allnurses.com/smallpox-vaccinations-t556483/

AFAIK, the polio vaccine was oral. I don't remember receiving it, but I know that I must have. Had there been an injector gun involved, maybe I would have remembered it too.

eta - to my original point, any vaccination talks should involve a mass vaccination program and not just in the US. The WHO managed to coordinate and perform a worldwide program that eradicated smallpox. With a pandemic like COVID-19, if a vaccine is developed, it's going to take a similar effort for that vaccine to work in eradicating the disease.

eta2 - given the problems with them since AIDS arrived, injector guns are not at all likely to be used.

[burrowowl]

17. Last small pox vaccinations in developed countries 1973

[ananda]

11. Life is very cheap and expendable right now..

The smash and grab Republican looters
want it that way.

[C Moon]

12. Of course they're going to charge for it:

less vaccines for the poor, means less vaccines for the Democratic Party.

[Amaryllis]

13. Cuomo in one of his briefkings said every human life is priceless.

[Demsrule86]

14. The vaccine won't arrive until Trump is out and President Biden has already said the vaccine will be

free. As an aside...there is much criticism of insurance companies but mine Blue Cross Blue Shield Antham is covering Covid with no deductibles or copayments.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

19. Let's get Congresswoman Katie Porter on this ...

(I've tried to bribe some Californians, offering to trade McConnell, Paul and all but 1 Kentucky Representative for Katie Porter, but they keep turning me down for some reason).