And also take a look at what safeguards we are willing to cut when every day of delay is thousands of deaths.

I'm well aware of how trials work (I happen to work in a scientific institution which does plenty). They may have been fast-tracked elsewhere, but not in my country.

So far there's just compassionate use, which means they're administered only to people who have truly severe sympthoms.

A vaccine can wait, to be honest, it's not as critical as a treatment to lessen the sympthoms. In fact, that's why Gilead is also testing their drug here (not sure when the actual protocols will start, though).

Note that I'm not advocating for "let's scrap all the trials stuff". But trials in phase III have, for obvious reasons, very lengthy time frames. And it's not the first time (I attended a talk a few years ago on the topic) where the system (which works, normally) shows its limits (not only emergencies, but for example orphan drugs).