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The EU Medicines Agency, EMA, has recommended approval of the corona vaccine from Biontech and Pfizer. The EU Commission now has to give its formal approval. So vaccinations could start in Germany immediately after Christmas.
As expected, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) has given the go-ahead for Biontech and Pfizer’s crown vaccine to be approved in the European Union. The EMA Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use (CHMP) recommended approval of the vaccine. The EMA spoke of a “milestone” in the fight against the corona pandemic, but at the same time warned that the pandemic had not yet reached its tipping point.
If the EU Commission now agrees, which is considered likely, the vaccine is formally approved across the EU. Immediately after the EMA’s decision, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that the Commission wanted to make a decision during the day. “Now we will act fast,” he tweeted. This is a crucial moment in efforts to offer safe and effective vaccines to Europeans.
Thus, immediately after Christmas, large-scale vaccination campaigns against coronavirus could also be given the go-ahead in those countries that, unlike Great Britain or Switzerland, had waived emergency approvals. The active ingredient BNT162b2 is already being vaccinated in the US.
The EMA assumes that the vaccine it recommends will also be effective against the variant of the coronavirus that has recently appeared in the UK. “At this time, there is no evidence to suggest that the vaccine will not work against the new variant,” said EMA Director Emer Cooke. But more information should be gathered about the new variant of the virus.
The sequence of vaccinations is determined
The EU vaccination strategy foresees a key that is determined according to the size of the population. National vaccination campaigns are scheduled to begin on December 27. The EU ordered the vaccination doses jointly. The number of doses that each Member State is entitled to purchase depends on the size of its population. For Germany, the federal Minister of Health, Jens Spahn, has stipulated the order in which citizens have the right to corona vaccination.
First, people 80 and older, as well as nursing home residents and employees, are on the line. A second priority is given to people with dementia, as well as people with trisomy 21 and transplant patients, as well as people in asylum or homeless shelters. The third group includes all persons 60 years of age and older, other high-risk patients, as well as employees of the police, fire and other authorities, employees of food retailers and seasonal workers.
€ 15.50 per vaccination dose
According to an internal document, the EU pays 15.50 euros per dose for the vaccine developed by Biontech and Pfizer. This stems from a letter that the Reuters news agency was able to see. The price was negotiated for a total of 300 million vaccination units. At $ 18.90, it is slightly below what the United States pays at $ 19.50 per vaccination unit for the first 100 million doses of the same product. The EU pricing document is dated November 18 and shipped within the EU after the community announced its supply agreement with Pfizer and Biontech on November 11.
