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A comment on The U.S. may be losing the fight against monkeypox, scientists say. Parent comment

Re:The U.S. may be losing the fight against monkeypox, scien... by qbasic_forever on Friday July 08, 2022 @06:26PM (#32028384)
We would not have ANY COVID vaccines if not for the _billions_ of dollars the US government spent with Operation Warp Speed. The entire operation (warp speed, building and funding multiple vaccines at once to only keep the working one at the end) was something the government designed _decades ago_ and kept as a potential mitigation for pandemics. We're in a position for you to comfortably post hot garbage takes from a brand new throwaway account from the COVID-free safety of your home because the government acted to respond to this pandemic...
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Re:The U.S. may be losing the fight against monkeypox, scien... by peyton on Friday July 08, 2022 @07:10PM (#32029039)
> The entire operation (warp speed, building and funding multiple vaccines at once to only keep the working one at the end) was something the government designed _decades ago_

That’s just not possible. Rapid-response vaccine platforms didn’t exist.

And indeed [1]

> The idea for Warp Speed was hatched in early April, says the official, a scientist, who was given permission to discuss it with Science if his name was not used. "Looking around, it became clear that without a really heroic effort, none of the existing efforts to produce vaccine was going to lead us to have vaccine to prevent what looks increasingly like a second wave that could sweep come October, November."

[1]: https://www.science.org/content/article/unveiling-warp-speed...

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Re:The U.S. may be losing the fight against monkeypox, scien... by qbasic_forever on Friday July 08, 2022 @07:17PM (#32029134)
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-03626-1

> In particular, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) was launched in 2017; its goal is to create the technological infrastructure needed for rapid and affordable development of vaccines against several of the viruses known to have epidemic potential, including MERS, Ebola and Zika. CEPI has partly funded work on SARS-CoV-2 vaccines, including that by Moderna and at Oxford.

CEPI is where the idea for Operation Warp Speed came from...

More generally though the article I reference is chock full of instances where without government funding and help we would never have had vaccines so quickly. The crackpot poster I replied to was trying to insinuate government did nothing and could do nothing to help. This is an absolutely incorrect assertion. We have vaccines because of government help and response in the early days (and years preceding!) of the pandemic.

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