With both our parents dead, and siblings having their own families to enjoy holidays, Amy and I avoid travel on Thanksgiving and/or Christmas.

Normally, we would venture out on both holidays to enjoy dinner at an Oriental restaurant, which is routinely open on holidays, but those choices are limited during the COVID-19 pandemic, so we will cook something at home and stay inside.

Working at home has become routine during these pandemic times. Our daughter and her husband lives nearly 3,000+ miles away and they, too, work at home and stay in. Zoom will be a way to visit during the holidays.

COVID-19 has become a way of life for eight months now and while there is hope for a new vaccine from one or two sources in the coming weeks, distribution and injection remain months away, if they work.

We wonder too if those who now reject vaccines as some conspiracy of the Deep State will prefer to take their chances with a deadly virus. Too many of them also threaten themselves and others by refusing to wear masks or practice social distancing.

There’s also the worry that a vaccine for a evolving virus like COVID-19 will be hit or miss, just like flu shots. They might work for some, but not others.

For the moment, the Centers for Disease Control says:

The goal for Operation Warp Speedexternal icon is to deliver safe vaccines that work, with the first supply becoming available before the end of 2020. When a vaccine is authorized or approved in the United States, there may not be enough doses available for all adults. Supplies will increase over time, and all adults should be able to get vaccinated later in 2021. However, a COVID-19 vaccine may not be available for young children until more studies are completed.

CDC adds:

The federal government will oversee a centralized system to order, distribute, and track COVID-19 vaccines. All vaccines will be ordered through CDC. Vaccine providers will receive vaccines from CDC’s centralized distributor or directly from a vaccine manufacturer.

Many COVID-19 vaccine candidates are in development, and clinical trials are being conducted at the same time with large-scale manufacturing. With first doses expected before the end of 2020, planning and preparing for a COVID-19 vaccination program is very important.

Planning efforts have focused on every step and detail of the process, including:

• Establishing and testing logistics plans with manufacturers and commercial partners that are part of CDC’s centralized COVID-19 vaccine delivery system
• Coordinating the first distribution of vaccines and needed supplies from centralized locations
• Ordering processes for additional doses of the vaccine after the first supply has been shipped
• Receiving, storing, and handling vaccines properly at very specific temperatures
• Deciding who should receive a vaccine first, based on national recommendations, if there are not enough doses of the vaccine for everyone
• Giving the vaccines in a safe way during an ongoing pandemic
• Reporting on vaccine inventory, administration, and safety using a variety of new and enhanced data systems
• Expanding safety surveillance through new systems and additional information sources, as well as scaling up existing safety monitoring systems
• Developing plans to assess vaccine effectiveness, which means how well the vaccines protect against COVID-19 under real-life conditions
• Making sure timely, credible, and clear communication is provided to the public and stakeholders around all aspects of the vaccination program

This situation continues to change, and planning will progress as more information about any authorized or approved vaccines becomes available. A safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine is a critical component of the U.S. strategy to reduce COVID-19-related illnesses, hospitalizations, and deaths and to help society function as it did before COVID-19. The goal of the U.S. government is to have enough COVID-19 vaccine doses for all people in the United States who choose to be vaccinated.

The keyword in all this is the”goal” to start delivering the vaccine before the end of this year and start inoculating. As with many goals, the timing could and most likely will slip into 2021 and it could take a year or more to vaccinate everyone.

Before that time, COVID-19 could mutate into a different stain that will need a different vaccine.

Time will tell and time is seldom on our side.