The following is a transcript of an interview with former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb that began on March 14, 2021, on “Face the Nation.”
MARGARET BRENNAN: We now turn to former FDA commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb. He sits aboard Pfizer as well as Illumina, and will be with us from Westport, Connecticut. Good morning to you.
DOCTOR SCOTT GOTTLIEB: Good morning.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So, Dr. Gottlieb, I want to ask you about the mayor of New York who seemed to disagree with Dr. Fauci, because Dr. Fauci said that these new changes are they track in New York City revealing resistance to medications and vaccines. The mayor of New York said his health department said – that the vaccine works. And of course, he said we don’t see a reinterpretation of people who existed before. What’s going on in New York?
DOCTOR SCOTT GOTTLIEB: Yeah, the trends in New York look anxious right now. If you look at other parts of the country where B.1.1.7, that variant from the United Kingdom that we have been looking at, becomes very common. So Florida, where it is about 50% of diseases, Texas, it is about 40% of diseases. You don’t really see an increase in infections. You’re probably seeing a plateau, but you don’t see this kind of frightened fourth wave even as B.1.1.7 starts to take over. In New York City as of 15.26, that new variant in New York, and B.1.1.7 is starting to become more common, you see a backlash in issues; you see a plateau. Hospitals are still slowly declining, but it’s kind of a plateau. There are about 3,000 new cases per day. The favorable rate is about 6%. It’s been like that for a week or two now. And so you see a kind of backup in New York that you don’t see in other parts of the country. So there are some worrying trends. Now, in terms of that new variant, that New York variant, 15.26, we’re worried about that. Currently, of the samples in order have this S gene name, so there are samples that we follow because we know they are mutations. About 40% of them are this 15.26. And New York is the only place in the country right now that we know where it is 15.26 that much of the disease and about half of those cases. So the same mutation in half of 15.26 cases is the same as in the South African variant, this 484K mutation that could make the virus more insensitive to our vaccines. So it’s a concern. We’re also seeing in with the 1.351, the South African variant, with this same 484K mutation. We see people getting another disease. And so whether that is starting to happen in New York and who explains those trends, we do not yet know. It’s still early days, but there are many reasons to be concerned about the trends in New York City.
MARGARET BRENNAN: From your point of view, is it too early then for the mayor to ask people to go back to the office in May, to ask for high achievements to go back to school personally as early as next week, going back to higher capacity seats in restaurants?
DR. GOTTLIEB: Look, I think we’ll know in the next couple of weeks where the trends are going in New York City. It’s hard to know for sure which way we’re going to come. But for now, the data in New York looks more worrying than other parts of the country. There are other places in the country that have opened liberally, that have a lot of B.1.1.7 and don’t see the same system as New York. Now, it may just be a backup, and we have continued the recessions in New York as we are seeing in other parts of the country in the next couple of weeks, or so. It may be the beginning of construction. We don’t know. I think the next couple of weeks are going to be a time of urgency. I would be careful in New York because if it was 15.26. to some extent explaining what’s going on in New York City, that could be very worrying. Yes – there are ways to explain what ‘s happening in New York that aren’t so worrying. That means, you know, this is just a kind of temporary blip and it will continue to diminish and then there are ways to explain it that would cause a lot of worries, including change 15.21-26.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So one of the hedges at the end of President Biden ‘s optimistic speech about COVID was these new variables. He said, we are looking at them. But he put that fourth July date on the calendar for collections. Is that a reasonable timeline?
DOCTOR SCOTT GOTTLIEB: I think so. I think most of the country is going to look a lot better long before that. I think you are seeing a downturn across the country, even in parts of the country where 1.1.7, that UK variant, is becoming quite common. You are still seeing a steady decline, albeit at a slower pace. I think the combination of many pre-existing diseases and the fact that we are now aggressive vaccination is enough to keep up with that and hope to get ahead. So I think as we get into April, the situation across the country is going to look a lot better. But there will be pockets of outburst and pockets where some of these variables will be more common that may look bad even though the rest of the country is going to look good. And New York is one of those parts of the country right now if you look at New York, there are worrying trends there. Even as other parts of the country improve, New York seems to be doing well. So I think overall, the route of the country looks good.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You’ve been saying look at Europe as an indication of what could be happening here. Europe is moving very slowly on their vaccines. Italy is looking to lock in over Easter because of what they are seeing. Should we expect that to be the case here?
DOCTOR SCOTT GOTTLIEB: Yeah, through this pandemic, we’ve been around three or four weeks behind Europe, so we’ve used Europe as a barometer of what’s going on. happened in the United States. I think the boards have turned and I think we are ahead of Europe because we are vaccinating much more aggressively. Eastern Europe is looking pretty bad right now. Italy looks bad, but I think the UK – the US is in a very different position through a combination of the fact that we have a lot of pre-existing diseases, so there is immunity in the UK. population from pre-existing diseases, and we have now vaccinated 25%. of adults. We vaccinate about 1.5 to two million new people every day. We have vaccinated about 65% of those over the age of 65 about 75% – almost 75% this week, above those – over the age of 75. And we are seeing the benefits of sin. 96% reduction in nursing homes, we are well versed with the vaccine. So I think we are in a different situation than Europe because of the immunization protection we are getting into the population.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Pfizer, where you serve at the table, their CEO said this week that he has seen the vaccines block 94% of asymptomatic diseases. Is that the last word that shows that if you do not get the vaccine, you cannot spread the virus?
DR. GOTTLIEB: It’s an important data point. This comes from real-world evidence from Israel and all the evidence across all vaccines now indicates that these vaccines reduce asymptomatic infections and reduce cross-vaccination. sent. We have always believed that they have that effect. We did not know the full extent of that gain. But the gradual emerging evidence suggests that the impact of a reduction in transmission could be quite strong. And if that is the case, the vaccine creates what we call end-of-life hosts, many end-dead hosts, meaning that humans will not be able to infect it. forward further. And just as you get an exponential spread on the way up in epilepsy, if you can get a full handful of immunity in people where they can no longer spread the disease, that has a worse effect on her. reducing the extent of the epilepsy. So if, of course, this vaccine has a major impact on transmission reduction, it is going to be a very important public health tool in controlling epilepsy.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Appropriately, Dr. Gottlieb, thanks for your review. We’ll be back in a minute.