 Marines, I'm Rear Admiral Jim Hancock. I'm the Medical Officer of the Marine Corps and I'm here today to try to answer your questions about the COVID-19 vaccine. After careful and thorough testing, the FDA has approved through an emergency use authorization the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. Drugs and vaccines have to be approved by the FDA to ensure that only safe and effective products are available to the American public. During public health emergencies, like this COVID-19 pandemic, when there is good scientific data showing that a product is both safe and effective at treating or preventing disease, the FDA may authorize its use through an EUA before having a year or more worth of data to fully license the product. They are voluntary because it was licensed under an EUA. In the civilian sector, employers can require these vaccines right now, but in the DOD, for now, COVID vaccine is voluntary. However, all Marine Corps personnel and beneficiaries are strongly encouraged to receive the vaccine when they become eligible. These vaccines are safe. We expect them to be very effective at protecting Marines, their families, and our communities. Department of Defense does not independently have the authority to mandate an EUA vaccine to service members. However, the president may make this mandatory. When one or more COVID vaccine is issued FDA licensure or if the president waives the options for members for the armed forces to decline the vaccine, it will or may become mandatory for military personnel, similar to an annual influenza vaccine and many others. The DOD and the Marine Corps are confident the FDA's stringent vaccine evaluation and oversight process and the assessment of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention known as the CDC. Manufacturers are required to submit all their trial data for the FDA to review and then an independent FDA review board must recommend the vaccines for approval. The CDC then conducts a separate evaluation after the FDA before they recommend its use. Vaccine safety, immune response, and effectiveness are all evaluated in tens of thousands of people before the FDA or the CDC will evaluate a vaccine and authorize it for use or distribution. If you have recently had COVID-19, you should not be vaccinated until you have recovered from any symptoms and have been cleared from home isolation. However, once you are cleared, everyone is encouraged to receive the vaccine when it is available to them because the duration of immunity following COVID-19 infection is unknown at this time. The vaccine may provide longer immunity than the natural COVID-19 infection. The simple answer is yes. The vaccine is only 95% effective so we still have Marines and families at risk. The vaccine works by building an immunity within your body. This takes one to two weeks. So please continue all precautions even after you've been vaccinated. No, it is not possible to get COVID-19 from our current two vaccinations. These vaccines use a cell's natural coding process to temporarily show the body's immune system a small portion of the COVID-19 virus. This causes the immune system to recognize the full virus and attack it if it enters the body. These vaccines do not contain live COVID virus, cannot cause you to develop COVID-19 disease and do not cause you to test positive for COVID-19 with any of our current diagnostic tests. The COVID-19 vaccines do not change or affect DNA. There is no evidence that the COVID-19 vaccines affect fertility. Additionally, experts believe that these vaccines are unlikely to pose a risk to pregnant persons, developing fetuses, breastfeeding women, or children because the vaccines contain no live COVID-19 virus. Current theories show that between 65% and 95% of people being vaccinated, we will achieve herd immunity. Marines, what you need to know is the vaccine is safe and we should do our part to keep America safe.