Watch Live: President Trump Updates Press On “Vaccine Development” Amid Beijing Showdown

On a day where tensions between the US and China have dominated the business news cycle, President Trump is holding a press conference Friday at noon to deliver an update on vaccine development.

According to media reports, Trump on Friday will officially introduce a former pharmaceutical executive and a four star-general who will lead his crash-coronavirus vaccine effort, which has been dubbed “Operation Warp Speeds”.

The new “Vaccine Czar” is General is Gustave Perna, director of the Army Materiel Command, who will serve as chief operating officer of the reassuringly-named OWS (you can tell Trump came up with the name himself). Administration officials have billed the effort as a “Manhattan Project”-style push (and not the only one, to boot) intended to quicken development of a vaccine. Former GSK exec Moncef Slaoui is expected to be named as a senior adviser to the project.

“I think we’re going to have a vaccine by the end of the year, and I think distribution will take place almost simultaneously because we’ve geared up the military,” Trump told reporters Thursday.

Trump will make Perna and Slaoui’s appointments official in remarks from the White House Rose Garden.

Since the White House Task Force is no longer holding daily briefings, we imagine Trump’s presser will be closely watched by politicos and the market.