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A corona vaccine has been approved for the first time in the US The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted the vaccine from Mainz-based biotech company BioNTech and its partner Pfizer an emergency approval Friday night. This applies to people over the age of 16, the FDA announced. The first vaccines are expected in the next few days.
The vaccine cleared the critical hurdle to approval Thursday after the FDA’s independent Vaccine Advisory Committee voted overwhelmingly in favor of approval.
Earlier, the White House is said to have urged US FDA chief Steven Hahn with threats of immediate emergency approval of the corona vaccine, according to media reports. The Washington Post reported that White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows asked Hahn on Friday to resign if the vaccine from Mainz-based company Biontech and its US partner Pfizer was not approved before the end of the day ( local time).
US President-elect Donald Trump also increased pressure on the FDA on Friday. He criticized the authority as a “big, old, slow tortoise.” He wrote on Twitter: “Give the damn vaccines now, Dr. Gallo. Stop playing games and start saving lives !!!” Trump had repeatedly lobbied the agency in the past to approve corona vaccines and therapies. , and was criticized for it.Trump also sees the rapid development of a corona vaccine as his success.
An FDA advisory committee had ruled Thursday in favor of granting emergency approval of the vaccine for Biontech and Pfizer for people 16 years of age and older. In the meeting held by videoconference, 17 of the experts voted in favor of admission, four voted against. The recommendation of the advisory committee is not binding, but the authority generally follows the recommendations of the experts. The United States government had contractually secured the delivery of 100 million doses of Pfizer / Biontech vaccines.
By Wednesday, the death toll in the United States had surpassed 3,000 in a single day for the first time since the pandemic began. According to statistics from Johns Hopkins University, the number of new registered infections was more than 200,000 in recent days. The future president of the United States, Joe Biden, announced on Tuesday a 100-day program to combat the pandemic, which he is following wanted to immediately implement his assumption of office on January 20. Part of the plan is to administer at least 100 million doses of a vaccine by that time.
Biden called the high number of coronavirus deaths a “tragic milestone.” “More than 3,000 deaths in a single day, the highest death toll during this pandemic,” he said Friday in Wilmington, Delaware. “That’s more deaths in a single day than we had on September 11 or at Pearl Harbor.” In his comments, Biden referred to the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York and Washington, as well as the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. (Hawaii) in December 1941. He again asked the Congress of the United States to end the months of tug of war and decide on a new aid package in the crisis.
Modern pharmaceutical company announced on Friday that the US government was purchasing another 100 million doses of its candidate vaccine. These cans would be delivered in the second quarter of next year. Of the first 100 million units already purchased by the US, 20 million would ship this month, the remaining 80 million in the first quarter of 2021. The US would also have the option to purchase another 300 million cans of Moderna. . The Moderna vaccine has not yet been approved by the FDA.
