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COVID-19: Cuomo appoints members of clinical advisory task force to review vaccines for safety and efficacy

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Tue, Sep 29th 2020 05:45 pm

Clinical advisory task force comprised of leading medical and science experts to review every vaccine authorized by federal government for distribution

Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Tuesday appointed the members of the state's independent clinical advisory task force that will review every COVID-19 vaccine authorized by the federal government, and will advise New York state on the vaccines' safety and effectiveness in fighting the virus.

"We want to make sure we can tell New Yorkers the vaccine is safe and then we want to have a distribution plan, and we're putting together our own group to determine that," Cuomo said. "Once the FDA says it's safe, we'll have a New York group of doctors and some of the best doctors around the world review what FDA did so I'll be able to say to New Yorkers it is safe. There are polls that say half the American people wouldn't take the vaccine right now because they don't believe it's safe. I want to be able to say to New Yorkers it is safe, take it, and I want to have the best distribution because ideally we want to be the first COVID-safe state in the nation."

The list of clinical advisory task force members are below:

  • Charles M. Rice, Ph.D., The Rockefeller University
  • Scott M. Hammer, M.D., New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center
  • Adolfo Garcia-Sastre, Ph.D., Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
  • Sharon Nachman, M.D., Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University
  • Kelvin Lee, M.D., Roswell Park
  • Bruce Farber, M.D., Northwell Health
  • Shawneequa Callier, M.A., J.D., George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences

The governor announced last week that the state is forming two separate initial task forces as part of New York's preparation for a COVID-19 vaccine. On Thursday, he announced initial appointments to the first task force, dedicated to planning logistics of the vaccine's administration and delivery. This announcement adds members to the second task force, charged with assessing a vaccine's safety and efficacy.

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