Dr. Marcos Sanchez-Gonzalez, Larkin Health System VP for Research & Academic Affairs, joins Yahoo Finance's Kristin Myers to discuss the latest coronavirus developments.

Video Transcript

KRISTIN MYERS: Let's talk now about the coronavirus pandemic. We heard not too long ago that the Britain's prime minister, Boris Johnson, raising a lot of concerns about those new strains and those variants of the coronavirus pandemic. Take a listen to what Dr. Fauci had to say about it.

ANTHONY FAUCI: Bottom line, we're paying very close attention to it. There are alternative plans if we ever have to modify the vaccine. That is not something that is a very onerous thing. We can do that, given the platforms we have. But right now, from the reports we have literally as of today, it appears that the vaccines will still be effective against them, with the caveat in mind you want to play close attention to it.

KRISTIN MYERS: I want to bring on Dr. Marcos Sanchez-Gonzalez, vice president for research and academic affairs at Larkin Health System. So doctor, we were just hearing from Dr. Fauci, talking about that variant, not seeming to raise too many alarm bells that the vaccines that we currently have won't still be effective against these new strains.

But again, we are hearing some pretty alarming news across the pond, Britain's prime Minister Boris Johnson saying, you know, this new strain may be more contagious. It might be more deadly. I'm wondering, from your perspective, when do we need to start getting really concerned about this?

MARCOS SANCHEZ-GONZALEZ: Well, the number one concern right now that we have with the new strains is that they are more contagious. And that means that we can spread the disease faster and get it to those populations that may be at high risk to get the severe symptoms. Early studies suggest that people that have been previously infected with COVID, and we used the plasma antibodies of those people to treat new patients or new cases, are not being effective against these new strains.

So, based on those early reports, that seems to suggest that, potentially, we're dealing with a kind of a new strain, that the existing treatment with plasma might not be as effective. That doesn't mean, as Dr. Fauci mentioned, that the vaccine, we cannot tweak it just ever so slightly to be effective against those new strains. I have some reports from colleagues from South Africa, they're telling me that yes, it is more contagious, and the severity of the cases are increased with the new strains, which is pretty much one of the concerns that we have.

KRISTIN MYERS: I'm wondering, we are seeing COVID cases declining a little bit, which is positive news, although one doctor yesterday said we've had that before, and then they've spiked again. But in your mind, how many steps back does this knock us, or does it knock us backwards a little bit in this fight against the virus's-- you know, the vaccine rollout is not going as well as folks are hoping or saying that we need it to be. And now we have to contend with possibly these new strains. And as you're suggesting, the treatments might not be as effective against it.

MARCOS SANCHEZ-GONZALEZ: Yeah, that's correct. One of the things that is very concerning for us right now is that as we get more people into the vaccine programs, one of the phenomena we're observing is that many of those individuals, they think they cannot get the disease. They think they cannot spread the disease. And that is leading to an increase in positive cases among those individuals, which is something that maybe some kind of counterintuitive.

But the truth of the matter is that the vaccines, what they do is basically decrease the probability to get the severe cases and keep people outside of hospitals. So our policies have to be, again, a little bit more stringent if we want to really, really take out the pandemic for good. We have to keep in mind as well that some of the mainstay treatments that we've been using, such as monoclonal antibodies for the control of the inflammatory response owing to the disease, has been under utilized. And we have to revisit those kind of treatments again.

KRISTIN MYERS: I want to ask you about how things are going down in Florida, particularly with this vaccine rollout. Governor DeSantis coming out and criticizing President Biden's plan and saying, frankly, that Florida does not need FEMA to come in and administer vaccine clinics. So I'm curious to know how things are going right now in Florida, at least with the vaccine rollout, just because I have to be honest. I am seeing a lot of news headlines. And a lot of them are pretty critical about the way that Florida has been handling things. And it sounds as if Governor DeSantis could really use all the help that he can get.

MARCOS SANCHEZ-GONZALEZ: Yeah, that's correct. We have to keep in mind that one of the priorities at the state level is to get people over the age of 65 vaccinated. So the real model by the government was 75 years. But most of the models predict that if we vaccinate people over 65, we should be more successful in doing so. So, Florida started that. Same happens with the federal response, or one of their goal is to spread the vaccination campaign. So 65 years of age is the same number they're using.

So, they are basically in synchrony in terms of who should get the vaccine. I think the discrepancy is coming to the logistics of how to be distributed. Here in Florida, some healthcare systems, and especially counties, we observe a very acute regionalization of the logistics. Some counties use one method versus others. So, that's to say we have some counties, such as in Broward, that is being rolling out very well. People are getting their vaccines-- Tallahassee, Leon County, where the state capital is.

But at the end of the day, I think everyone should work together in this. And we need to get those vaccination programs working as fast as possible. We want to decrease the amount of people in hospitals. And we cannot let the guard down, just because people is getting vaccinated, meaning that we just have to open schools without taking the precautionary actions.

KRISTIN MYERS: All right, Dr. Marco Sanchez-Gonzalez, the vice president for research and academic affairs at Larkin Health System, thanks so much for joining us today.

MARCOS SANCHEZ-GONZALEZ: Thank you for having me.