First, let’s try a thought experiment: Imagine, for a moment, that Donald Trump had gotten what he so eagerly sought: emergency use authorization for coronavirus vaccines before the November election, rather than – as actually occurred – six weeks afterward.

If the former president, a lifelong promoter, had the vaccines in hand, the election result might have been different, and he wouldn’t have had to keep lying about his defeat. As a result, by this time, we might have had near-universal “shots into arms,” rather than the 70% of those eligible with at least first doses.

The pandemic would be nearly over and the U.S. could – as it still should – begin exporting billions of doses to the underdeveloped world; in Africa, the entire population is still essentially unvaccinated.

With Trump still at the helm, those who now resist the shots would have embraced them, and this particular division – heartbreaking, given the thousands of unnecessary deaths and needless suffering – would never have existed.

Instead, we are having still more debates about masks, which in states like Maine is almost useless, since its small population causes CDC guidance about county case numbers to shift almost daily.

President Biden has been laboring mightily to do all he can to get most Americans vaccinated, but in one key respect he has fallen short.

While almost all of the controversy has surrounded the CDC, the nation’s public health agency, the real action should be taking place at the FDA, the Food and Drug Administration, which is responsible for vaccine approvals.

While Biden appointed an acknowledged infectious disease star, Rochelle Walensky, to head CDC – she started work the day of the inauguration – the FDA still lacks a permanent head.

The acting commissioner, Janet Woodcock, named in February, hasn’t inspired confidence. Over the near-unanimous objections of the FDA’s independent expert panel, she approved an Alzheimer’s drug of doubtful efficacy.

Meanwhile, she’s dragged her feet on permanent approval of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, for which the companies applied on May 7 and June 1.

Permanent approval is essential because it would promote the wider use of vaccine mandates by employers, universities and government agencies.

Maine is a good example. In April, Maine CDC added annual influenza shots to those required for all health care workers, but it hasn’t acted on COVID shots, citing the lack of permanent approval.

Until this week, when Maine Health and Northern Light changed their minds, only one Maine hospital, in Millinocket, was requiring shots. Several private colleges have mandates, but the University of Maine System is still relying on frequent testing for the unvaccinated.

Mandates work. Houston Methodist – a major hospital chain in “deep red” Texas – started requiring shots in June, won the resulting lawsuit, and saw just 0.6% of its staff leave rather than be vaccinated. By now its entire workforce is fully vaccinated, just what we’d like to see for those treating the most acutely ill patients.

It appears the FDA is finally getting the message. The head of its vaccine division, Peter Marks, told the Washington Post late last week the agency now has an “all hands on deck” strategy to finish pre-approval evaluations.

It’s about time. Biden’s predecessor never hesitated to put heat on executive agencies, and in this instance it’s appropriate. Biden also needs to name a permanent commissioner, but confirmation will take time.

We have perhaps three months left before “flu season” drives people indoors and facilitates viral spread, with potentially catastrophic results – which were all too real last winter. The FDA is now aiming for September, but approval in August would make a big difference as schools reopen and students return to campuses.

Blanket mandates from Washington and the states are probably constitutional but would create protracted resistance, and aren’t really necessary. Private sector mandates could boost vaccinations well over 90%; at that point the American pandemic would be over and we could lend our formidable scientific and technological expertise to the world.

Theories about adverse effects from the vaccines have been disproven over and over. This truly is a modern scientific miracle – enormous protection against death and serious illness, even where cases still occur, with very few reactions of any significance.

Yet the theories keep getting weirder and more provocatively expressed; one anti-vax event in Belfast last week featured the claim that “vaccines are death.” But saying it doesn’t make it so.

The hour is late; we don’t need more cash incentives for reluctant Americans. We need to face a more basic reality.

The time for persuasion is over. The time for mandates has arrived.

Douglas Rooks has been a Maine editor, commentator, reporter and author since 1984. His new book is “First Franco: Albert Beliveau in Law, Politics and Love.” He welcomes comment at drooks@tds.net.