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The EU will use its potential to buy up to 100 million more doses of the Pfizer / BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine after turning down the opportunity for a much larger deal in July, according to officials and an internal document.
The plan comes after some of the candidate vaccines requested by the EU experienced unexpected delays in clinical trials, forcing the European bloc and other wealthy countries to now rely on vaccines from fewer manufacturers than originally planned.
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As mentioned in the RES-EIA, the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine, the First COVID-19, approved by Western drug regulators, is circulating in countries like Britain and the United States, and is expected to be approved for use in the EU next week.
The European Commission on Tuesday decided to continue with its purchase option of up to 100 million additional installments under the current contract with Pfizer and BioNTech, an EU spokesperson told Reuters today. Under the same contract, it has already ordered 200 million dues. .
“We want to be sure that we will receive more quotas because there is a great demand,” the spokesman said.
An EU official said they were in talks about how many of those additional 100 million doses would be received. Pfizer did not respond to a request for comment, while BioNTech declined to comment.
Under the agreement with the EU, the two companies have pledged to hand over 200 million quotas immediately after regulatory approval, for 15.5 euros a unit, European officials told Reuters in November.
The additional 100 million installments will be available at the same price, but the schedule will be negotiated, European officials said.
Pfizer and BioNTech have said they can produce around 1.3 billion doses by the end of 2021, but are trying to increase production capacity as global demand grows.
Rejected Orders for More Pfizer Vaccines
Discussions about ordering more Pfizer vaccines before the first batches arrive reflect pressure from the EU to secure larger quantities in an effort to tackle the pandemic that has already claimed the lives of 470,000 Europeans and is increasing. speed during the winter months.
This contrasts with the more relaxed attitude of EU negotiators in the summer, when the pandemic seemed to subside and the European bloc was signing supply agreements with many vaccine companies.
In a meeting with European diplomats in July, a Commission official said the EU had rejected an offer of 500 million doses of the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine because it was too expensive, according to an internal document accessed by Reuters.
The Commission and BioNTech declined to comment. Pfizer did not respond to a request for comment. With a population of 450 million, the European bloc now depends only on the 200 million vaccines Pfizer has already ordered for the first vaccines, which are expected to start around Christmas.
The EU is also expected to approve the vaccine developed by Moderna in January, but has an initial order for just 80 million doses, with an option for an additional 80 million. The commission also decided this week to seize this opportunity immediately, the EU spokesman said.
The Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require two doses per person. Pfizer vaccines for the EU are manufactured in a factory in Belgium, but currently the unit also supplies the US, UK and Canada.
“We have millions of doses ready to be distributed, subject to regulatory approval,” a factory spokesman told Reuters when asked if the quantities shipped outside the EU could temporarily reduce supplies to the European bloc.
Overall, the EU has “reserved” almost 1.3 billion vaccines in agreements with Pfizer / BioNTech, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, AstraZeneca / Oxford, Sanofi / GSK and CureVac, with the potential to purchase an additional 660 million However, clinical trials of vaccines developed by AstraZeneca and Sanofi are delayed, while CureVac full-scale testing has not started yet.
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