--- title: Colin Powell's COVID-19 Death Is a Reminder of Risk Facing Elderly description: Colin Powell's death reminds us that COVID-19 is not just a pandemic of the unvaccinated, but a pandemic of the elderly, too. canonical: https://time.com/6108012/colin-powell-covid-19/ author: Alex Fitzpatrick article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2021-10-18T20:25:04.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-14T09:15:45.456Z article:section: Health og:title: What Colin Powell's Death Says About the Pandemic og:description: It's not just a 'pandemic of the unvaccinated' og:url: https://time.com/6108012/colin-powell-covid-19/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt12d46147a5f44867/698a1de1656a3f5702bdbbb7/colin-powell-covid.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: Colin Powell COVID og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: What Colin Powell's Death Says About the Pandemic twitter:description: It's not just a 'pandemic of the unvaccinated' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt12d46147a5f44867/698a1de1656a3f5702bdbbb7/colin-powell-covid.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # What Colin Powell's COVID-19 Death Says About the Current State of the Pandemic > Sponsored content. 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Inside BioNTech's quest to vaccinate the world_  by [Alex Fitzpatrick](https://time.com/author/alex-fitzpatrick/)  ## Alex Fitzpatrick Oct 18, 2021 8:25 PM UTC Inside BioNTech's quest to vaccinate the world  by [Alex Fitzpatrick](https://time.com/author/alex-fitzpatrick/)  ## Alex Fitzpatrick Oct 18, 2021 8:25 PM UTC The death of [Colin Powell,](https://time.com/6107901/colin-powell-legacy/) an 84-year-old former four-star general who served as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under U.S. President George H.W. Bush and Secretary of State under President George W. Bush and is perhaps best known for his role in bringing the U.S. into its second war in Iraq, is a high-profile reminder of a grim reality: COVID-19 is not just a pandemic of the unvaccinated, as current president Joe Biden likes to say, but a pandemic of the elderly, too. From early on in the pandemic, we’ve known the virus disproportionately kills older people, and the overall data make that pretty clear: About 543,200 people 65 or older have died with COVID-19 in the U.S. so far, [per the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid%5Fweekly/index.htm) Prevention (CDC), or about 76.2% of the country’s total death toll, despite making up just [16.5% of the pre-pandemic population](https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/distribution-by-age/?currentTimeframe=0&selectedDistributions=65&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D). When vaccinations began to roll out in the beginning of this year, it became evident almost immediately that people who received a full course of a vaccine—including the elderly—were less likely to become gravely ill from COVID-19\. Before the Delta variant took hold in the summer, those 65 and over who had been fully vaccinated were hospitalized at a rate of less than 5 people per 100,000 on average, compared to about 40 per 100,000 among their unvaccinated peers. **_Read more:_**[_Colin Powell and the transformative power of owning your mistakes_](https://time.com/6107901/colin-powell-legacy/) As the Delta variant became widespread, that disparity widened. In late August (the most recent month for which CDC data is available), when Delta cases were surging across the country and the FDA hadn’t yet authorized booster shots, the oldest vaccinated Americans were being hospitalized for COVID-19 at a rate of only 15 people per 100,000\. For their unvaccinated peers, on the other hand, the rate had surged to more than 200. Nevertheless, it remains a reality that the elderly—even those who are vaccinated—are at risk for serious COVID-19\. Indeed, vaccinated people 80 and above have died at significantly higher rates than even some unvaccinated younger people, per the CDC (though, of course, they still fare remarkably better than their unvaccinated peers). In part, this is likely because older people are more likely to have conditions that make them more susceptible to infection, or that blunt vaccinations’ impact. Powell, for instance, was fully vaccinated, but also had multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer that weakens the immune system. It’s these factors that led a U.S. Food and Drug Administration panel to authorize Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna boosters specifically for Americans 65 and up (plus younger folks at higher risk for health or occupational reasons) in recent weeks. Another dose, the thinking goes, should help better protect our most vulnerable neighbors. A [promising Israeli study](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02516-4) published last month showed that people over 60 who got a Pfizer booster were nearly 20 times less likely to develop severe disease, data that in part informed the FDA panel’s decision. Even if cases keep falling, the relative risk facing older people will remain fairly high, in part because falling cases will lead more people to engage in riskier behaviors, potentially leading them to spread the virus to elderly loved ones—Thanksgiving and the winter holidays are just around the corner, and were major drivers of spread last year. The key now is convincing vaccinated older Americans to get their booster shot, and getting those who remain unvaccinated to get their first doses. The former should be far easier—older Americans are vaccinated at much higher rates compared to younger groups, perhaps in part because they generally have more to fear from the virus, and those who got their shots once or twice will likely be willing to get another. Convincing the latter will be a steep climb; what’s left to say to those who remain unprotected despite facing the greatest risk? That Powell died of a breakthrough infection is already fueling the anti-vaccine fire, as people incorrectly cite his death as evidence of the vaccines’ imperfection, even though it’s really just more evidence that a more fully vaccinated population and boosters are both urgently needed. --- _This story was adapted from_ The Coronavirus Brief, _TIME’s daily COVID-19 newsletter._ [_Sign up here._](https://time.com/newsletters/) ## Transcript Kind: captions Language: en oh yes yes i'm vaccinated yes Very cool yes yeah yes, I did it was very cool to to know okay I'm gonna be vaccinated with a vaccine that I know really from day one I mean who can tell that they're part of the solution for such a pandemic situation I guess only a few people can say that and I'm really happy to be part of that If you've been vaccinated for COVID-19, chances are that you are benefiting from the science happening here at the German biotech company BioNtech. In December 2020 BioNtech in partnership with Pfizer were the first to earn authorization to distribute their vaccine to the public In March 2021 TIME spent a week watching how BioNtech makes a batch of 8 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine at their new manufacturing plant in Marburg they expect to produce 1 billion doses a year the pace of production has been breakneck from the start So in 2020 I think we worked at every holiday, I can remember Easter Saturday I was standing here pipetting samples to have the results as soon as possible and now 24-hour shifts in this lab are producing vaccines that will be shipped around the world There are approximately 50, 000 steps at the lab it begins with bags of pure mRNA the molecule that tells cells how to make the proteins that launch the immune response and a buffer solution that starts the coding process it emerges in bulk at the other end of the process as a liquid destined for vials most of the machines are named after the engineers that developed the process this one is named after Margaret the first patient in the clinical trials to receive the vaccine but the beating heart of the lab is this machine a container that uses pressurized ethanol to encase the mRNA and special lipid nanoparticles those nanoparticles keep the mRNA protected until it can jumpstart the immune response in the body's cells Speed is essential but inside the lab everyone moves slowly and methodically each of the 50,000 steps is logged by one technician confirmed by a second and only then does it actually happen it's very important that the quality of the product and all the raw materials is perfect here and so no impurities should be present in all raw materials and nothing which we don't want to have in our products one wrong move has the potential to damage the final product if there's any accidental exposure let's say from an ill-timed sneeze the entire batch must be thrown out, all eight million doses that's why everyone wears layers of protection and they even disinfect their gloved hands repeatedly in the lab where we were filming no one had ever told the technicians how many doses were in a batch after that they sprayed another application of disinfectant onto their gloves just to be sure based on our technology and on the antigen we were using no I wasn't I'm very confident in the technology we have until now vaccine development has been a slow process the BioNtech vaccine uses a new technology based on mRNA it is revolutionizing the way vaccines can be produced When the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, BioNtech was primarily a cancer vaccine company but by using this new mRNA technology it was able to quickly pivot to a coronavirus vaccine when you look back at any project you've ever done you've always looked back at the start and go wow okay if I'd known that now i could have cut you know a few hurdles out of my way earlier right but you're in a situation where you're doing something especially for us as a smaller company that was unprecedented the second part of the process happens at another factory where vials are filled and packed into boxes for shipment as the cycle comes to an end there's little time to celebrate after all another batch is waiting to be made ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/6108012/colin-powell-covid-19/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/6108012/colin-powell-covid-19/"},"headline":"What Colin Powell's COVID-19 Death Says About the Current State of the Pandemic","datePublished":"2021-10-18T20:25:04.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-14T09:15:45.456Z","description":"It's not just a 'pandemic of the vaccinated'","url":"https://time.com/6108012/colin-powell-covid-19/","keywords":["COVID-19","healthscienceclimate"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt12d46147a5f44867/698a1de1656a3f5702bdbbb7/colin-powell-covid.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Alex Fitzpatrick","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/alex-fitzpatrick/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt12d46147a5f44867/698a1de1656a3f5702bdbbb7/colin-powell-covid.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Colin Powell COVID","caption":"General Colin L. 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