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The vaccine, developed in collaboration with the University of Oxford, is already being distributed in Britain, but has not yet been approved by the European Union. A decision on its distribution in the Community is expected to be made before January 29.
The AstraZeneca report says that if the EU approves the vaccine, it will be “less than expected”, although the start of distribution itself will not be delayed.
The company explained this by “reduced productivity at the production site within our European supply chain”, but did not provide further details.
In any case, AstraZeneca has said it will deliver “millions of doses” to the EU and increase production in February and March.
Stefan de Kersmecker, a health spokesman for the European Commission, told AFP that the AstraZeneca news agency had confirmed changes to the vaccine’s distribution plans during a meeting on Friday.
“We are trying to find out more,” he said.
Stella Kyriakides, European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, said that both the EC and EU members had expressed “profound dissatisfaction” with the company’s decision during a vaccine committee meeting.
“We demand a precise supply plan, based on which Member States should plan their vaccination programs if a conditional marketing authorization is granted,” he said in a Twitter statement.
“The @ES_Commission will continue to urge @AstraZeneca to take steps to increase predictability and stability of supply, as well as to accelerate dose distribution,” Kiriakides added.
It is not yet clear how many doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine it originally planned to deliver to the 27-nation bloc.
The company said last year that it had agreed with the European Commission that the European Union would buy up to $ 400 million. dose.
The European Union declares that it has obtained advance agreements for more than 2 million euros. doses of vaccines developed by various manufacturers. About 450 million. it would be more than sufficient for the community population, provided that all preparations are approved as adequate.
The AstraZeneca vaccine is considered important to vaccination efforts against the global pandemic coronavirus because it is cheaper to produce and does not require extremely low storage temperatures.
To date, the European Union has allowed the distribution of vaccines developed by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.
Although coronavirus vaccines have been developed and approved at a record rate, the first batches of products delivered were smaller than expected by many EU members.
Pfizer has announced that the pace of vaccine supply will slow in the coming weeks due to work to be done at its parent company in Belgium.
In the EU, more than 5 million people have been injected so far. dose. The Community intends to vaccinate 70% at the end of August. adult population.
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