“Securing another 100 million doses from Moderna by June 2021 further expands our supply of doses across the Operation Warp Speed portfolio of vaccines,” said Azar.
The U.S. has a confirmed total of 300 million doses that is expected to be enough to vaccinate 150 million Americans. There are 200 million doses coming from Moderna and 100 million doses from Pfizer/BioNTech.
Moderna, a biotechnology company that was founded only a decade ago, is leading the way in messenger RNA (mRNA) therapeutics and vaccines. This mRNA-1273 vaccine is Moderna’s first commercial product and is putting over $4 billion dollars from the government into the company’s pockets.
As some companies fall, other companies are gaining momentum during the pandemic. Moderna is at the forefront in vaccine development and has the potential to become an ultimate gamechanger in medicine as COVID-19 numbers continue to rise in the U.S. and abroad.
More than 72 million coronavirus cases have been confirmed globally with the U.S. accounting for over 22% (16.3 million) of the total cases reported, according to data from the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.
Unfortunately, death rates have been rapidly increasing as exposure spreads — more than 299,000 U.S. and over 1.6 million people around the world have died from the coronavirus since the pandemic began.