United States surpasses one million people vaccinated

The United States has now administered the COVID-19 vaccine to over 1 million Americans, this comes as the country ends a difficult year which saw millions of cases and hundreds of thousands of lives lost to the virus.

"With cases of COVID-19 continuing to surge nationwide, this achievement comes at a critical time and will help to protect those on the frontline -- our healthcare providers treating COVID-19 patients -- as well as our most vulnerable: elder individuals living in nursing homes and assisted living facilities," said CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield.

The Trump Administration says it plans to distribute 20 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines in the next few weeks. They have so far distributed 9.5 million doses.

Gen. Gustave Perna, chief operating officer of Operation Warp Speed, said to reporters on Wednesday that "It's been a big week of delivery of vaccines.'

He added "Over 7,800 deliveries by the end of tomorrow, as we are delivering the 7.9 million doses of vaccine that were allocated for this week around the country -- really a tremendous feat."

Perna said that around 15.5 million vaccine doses have been allocated and another 4.5-5 million will be allocated in the next week. "We'll finish those deliveries in the first week of January."

The vaccine has made its way to 238 long-term case home in 12 states, thanks to the coordinated efforts by the US Government and two pharmacy chains, reports CNBC.

"Walgreens and CVS are being received by cheering crowds, and they're operationalizing their efforts to make sure everybody gets the shots," Perna said in a media briefing.

Thirteen more states and an additional 1000 long-term care facilities are expected to receive vaccine doses next week. Perna adds that “Every week we're just building on that as we go,”

Due to the arrival of millions of doses of the vaccine, officials expect to see a decline in coronavirus deaths as the vulnerable people will be immune to the disease.

“Within two weeks from starting to immunize subjects that are living in long-term care facilities, we should start to see a decrease in the overall mortality in the country,” said task force member Moncef Slaoui.

So far, the United States has had over 18.5 million cases of COVID-19 and 326,000 deaths. Over 228,000 new cases have been reported in the last 24 hours.