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Moderna Inc. Chief Executive Stéphane Bancel said the federal government could authorize emergency use of the company’s experimental Covid-19 vaccine in December, if the company gets positive interim results in November from a large clinical trial. Mr. Bancel, speaking during The Wall Street Journal’s annual Tech Live conference Monday, said if sufficient interim results from the study takes longer to get, government authorization of the vaccine may not occur until early next year. (Loftus, 10/19)

For those closely watching the development of Covid-19 vaccines, Thursday is a crucial date. Nothing extraordinary is expected to happen when a committee of outside experts — known as the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee, or VRBPAC — meets for the first time to consider Covid-19 vaccines. But the very convening of the meeting is a reassuring sign that the Food and Drug Administration, which relies on VRBPAC for advice, plans to do what it usually does: Make decisions based not on political timetables but on data that show whether new vaccines are safe and effective. (Branswell, 10/20)

States still have no idea how they're going to pay for coronavirus vaccine distribution, despite filing plans last week, state officials said Monday. Friday was the deadline for states to submit their plans to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but they still don't have the needed federal money to help carry them out, officials said. (Holcombe and Vera, 10/19)

California won’t allow any distribution of coronavirus vaccines in the nation’s most populous state until it is reviewed by the state’s own panel of experts, Gov. Gavin Newsom said Monday. Vaccinations for the pandemic “will move at the speed of trust,” said Newsom, a Democrat, and the state wants its own independent review no matter who wins the presidential election next month. (Thompson, 10/20)

Vidant Health Tuesday said it's part of a new pilot program to deliver vaccines directly from a manufacturer to one of its facilities via drone. The pilot, launched with drone delivery company Volansi, delivers vaccines for such disease as the measles, mumps and rubella—or MMR—from a Merck & Co. manufacturing facility in rural Wilson, N.C., to a Vidant Health clinic in the same city. The program uses drones from Volansi that can carry 10 pounds of cargo for up to 50 miles. (Cohen, 10/20)

Before COVID-19 upended our lives, clinical vaccine trials typically made news only when they were done—when scientists could definitively say, Yes, this one works or No, it doesn’t. These days, every step of the COVID-19 vaccine-development process comes under intense public scrutiny: This vaccine works in monkeys! It’s safe in the 45 people who have gotten it! The entire trial is on pause because one participant got sick, but we don’t know yet whether the person got a vaccine or a placebo! (Zhang, 10/19)