#Fauci says COVID-19 vaccine may only be 50 percent effective

The odds of the eventual coronavirus vaccine being highly effective are “not great,” White House infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci said Friday — noting that a success rate of 50 percent would be passable.

“The chances of it being 98 percent effective is not great,” said Fauci during a Q&A with the Brown University School of Public Health in Rhode Island, according to CNBC.

Instead, scientists are hoping for a vaccine for the deadly disease that is 75 percent effective — but even a 50 or 60 percent success rate would be considered a win, Fauci reportedly went on to say.

“Which means you must never abandon the public health approach,” explained Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

As of Friday afternoon, the US had tallied over 4.9 million cases of the coronavirus, with 160,394 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.