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The government sent a letter to the manufacturer AstraZeneca in which it supports private Brazilian companies to acquire a batch of 33 million doses of vaccine since half of the batch is donated to the SUS (Unified Health System), as revealed by the Panel on Monday (25). .
In the letter, sent in English on Friday (22), the government copies the investment fund Black Rock, which has shares in the Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical company, and an export company called BRZ.
The text is signed by Ministers Wagner Rosário (Federal Comptroller General) and José Levi (Federal Attorney General), as well as Elcio Franco, Executive Secretary of the Ministry of Health.
In the document, revealed by the newspaper O Globo and confirmed by leaf, the government lists some conditions, such as that companies cannot market immunizers and must apply them for free to their employees. Also, there should be a vaccine tracking system.
The matter was discussed with President Jair Bolsonaro (without a party) last week and authorized the release of purchases by companies. To successfully complete the acquisition, the companies must still obtain an import and emergency use authorization for the vaccine from Anvisa.
According to government officials, the Executive decided not to oppose the purchase because the lot negotiated by private companies is much more expensive than the one already acquired by the Ministry of Health.
The dose, in the agreement built by the companies, is in the range of US $ 23.79, a value much higher than that practiced in the market.
In addition, the government expects companies to donate more than half of what will be purchased to the Ministry of Health. In other words, the government can receive more than 16.5 million doses, enough to immunize 8.25 million people.
There were those in the Executive who did not agree with the hypothesis that companies vaccinate employees before the SUS completed the immunization of the elderly, but this opinion was rejected.
Although large companies have resigned from participating in a group that seeks to buy vaccines, other companies met on Monday (25) and insist on negotiations with the government.
The meeting was developed by videoconference and had 72 participants. According to people in charge of the group, the number of companies interested in purchasing the immunizer has been increasing every hour.
At the meeting, Fábio Spina, Gerdau’s legal director, considered the coordinator of the negotiation, asked each company to express itself until this Tuesday (26) on whether or not to make the purchase.
Still at the meeting, the terms that could be offered to the Ministry of Health to make the purchase feasible were discussed. It was also predicted that, after the acquisition, with the transfer of resources, the vaccines would arrive in Brazil in ten days.
One disputed idea is that companies keep a small batch of vaccines and donate the rest to SUS.
One calculation is that with just over 1% of the total doses it would be possible to immunize employees of all concerned. The rest would go to the federal government.
An executive who is in charge of the negotiations guarantees that the negotiations with the government are going well and that is why companies are hopeful about the possibility of buying.
After the leaf The intention of the private companies to acquire the vaccines was published on Monday, the large companies said that they were only invited to participate in the group and declined the invitation or otherwise stopped participating. Among them are Ambev, Itaú, JBS, Santander, Vivo and Vale.
According to the businessmen, Ambev was contacted by phone, but did not want to participate in further talks.
Others, like Vale, did not agree with the terms that were being debated and defended that companies donate 100% of the doses to the government.
Despite the stampede of giants, negotiators say that several companies have tried to join the initiative.
