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British pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca has warned that supplies of its coronavirus vaccine to Europe will be “lower than originally anticipated” due to reduced production at a manufacturing site.
The jab he developed with the University of Oxford in England is already being rolled out in the UK, but the European Union has not yet approved its use. He is expected to make a decision before January 29.
AstraZeneca said in a statement that if EU approval is granted, “initial volumes will be lower than anticipated,” although the start would not be delayed.
The company blamed “reduced yields at a manufacturing site within our European supply chain,” without giving details.
He said that in any case it would supply the EU with “millions of doses” while increasing production in February and March.
Stefan De Keersmaecker, a health spokesman for the European Commission, said AstraZeneca had confirmed the change to its delivery schedule in a meeting on Friday, adding: “We are working to find out more.”
Stella Kyriakides, European commissioner for health and food safety, said both the commission and member states had expressed “deep dissatisfaction” with the measure at a meeting of the vaccine committee.
“We insist on a precise delivery schedule based on which member states should plan their vaccination programs, subject to the granting of a conditional marketing authorization,” he said on Twitter.
.@EU_Commission and Member States expressed deep dissatisfaction with this. We insist on a precise delivery schedule on the basis of which Member States should plan their vaccination programs, subject to the granting of a provisional marketing authorization. / 2
– Stella Kyriakides (@SKyriakidesEU) January 22, 2021
It was unclear how many doses AstraZeneca was initially expected to deliver to the 27-country bloc.
The firm said last year that it had agreed with the European Commission to supply up to 400 million doses.
The EU has said it has won contracts for more than two billion doses, more than enough for its total population of 450 million, provided all vaccines are approved.
The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine is considered key to the global vaccination effort because it is cheaper to produce and can be stored at refrigerator temperature.
So far, the EU has approved vaccines manufactured by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.
While coronavirus vaccines have been developed and approved at record speed, deliveries of the first batches have been lower than many EU members expected.
Pfizer has announced delays in shipments of its vaccine in the coming weeks due to works at its main processing plant in Belgium.
EU countries have administered more than 5 million doses to citizens to date. The goal is to inoculate 70% of the adults by the end of August.
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