This vaccine even if they had got it out twice as fast would not have stopped Wuhan. Every shot available for the first 6 mos was used as soon as it hit the market. I was one who waited 3 mos playing the Publix lottery trying to get it. They produced the shot as fast as they could and couldn't keep up with demand. I agree it was amazing how fast they got it out in large part thanks to Trump who streamlined the process to get it out. It was well into the Summer before they had more shots than they could distribute, The initial wave was done, and we were up and running in Fl. That is why they kept going younger on who could receive them.
Even with the shot people got the original virus though they rarely died which I said is a positive. But it is also true that those who had the shot spread it, as they often were not very sick. We have a friend who had the first 2 shots and died of Covid. If the shot was going to stop it in its tracks, it would have to be close to 100% effective. this was not.
That said, they knew very early on there were more side effects than normal and some were real bad. Covid was less of an issue than the flu for 60% of the population, and basically was the flu for another 25%. If you were over 80 years old is was a real killer. We to this day have no idea how bad it really was because if you died and had Covid they called it a covid death, even if you died in a motorcycle accident, house fire, or like my neighbor cancer.