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The European Commission wants to ensure access to six possible vaccines for covid-19 to distribute in the European Union (EU) and will sign “in the coming days” a procurement contract with the pharmaceutical companies BioNTech and Pfizer.
The announcement was made on Tuesday by the European Commissioner for Health, Stella Kyriakides, in an interview with several European news agencies, including Lusa.
“So far, we have already concluded three agreements, with AstraZeneca, Sanofi-GSK and Johnson & Johnson, and we have already concluded negotiations with three other vaccine producers: BioNTech and Pfizer, Curevac and Moderna, so it is likely that we have a portfolio of about six promising vaccines, ”said Stella Kyriakides.
“This was our goal from the beginning, to have a portfolio that would allow us to have a greater chance of being successful in accessing safe and effective vaccines,” added the person in charge in this interview with Lusa and other agencies, such as AFP and Efe. , to be published in full on Wednesday.
The European Commissioner for Health also classified Monday’s news as “quite encouraging” about the 90% effectiveness of a potential vaccine for covid-19 by US pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech.
“In the case of BioNTech and Pfizer, we have already concluded the negotiations and we expect this contract to be signed in the next few days,” after the document was formally adopted at the college of commissioners on Wednesday, Stella Kyriakides said.
The EU has already started data assessment
Regarding the validation procedures, the official said that “the European Medicines Agency has already started its continuous evaluation of the data regarding the BioNTech and Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines. “This means that the European Medicines Agency has started to evaluate the preliminary part of these vaccines, in terms of laboratory studies, not clinical data,” he explained.
Already asked about the availability of vaccines for the EU Member States, Stella Kyriakides stressed that, as agreed by the countries, this will be a “population-based” distribution and will be done at the same time for all, when possible vaccines prove to be effective. and sure.
On Monday, Pfizer revealed that provisional data on its vaccine against the novel coronavirus indicates that it can be effective in 90% of cases.
However, the announcement does not mean that a vaccine is imminent. The interim analysis, conducted by an independent data monitoring board, found 94 infections recorded so far in a study involving nearly 44,000 people in the United States and five other countries. Pfizer did not provide further details on these cases and cautioned that the initial protection rate may change at the end of the study.
Also this Tuesday, the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said in a statement that the community executive will approve this Wednesday the acquisition of 300 million doses of the vaccine from BioNTech and Pfizer, calling it “more promising so far” .
So far, the European Commission has signed contracts with three pharmacists to guarantee vaccines for Europe when they are effective and safe: AstraZeneca (300 million doses), Sanofi-GSK (300 million) and Johnson & Johnson (200 million).
Italy and Spain already have vaccines
The Spanish Minister of Health, Salvador Illa, revealed this Tuesday that the Government expects to receive the first doses of the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine against covid-19 in early 2021. “We estimate that 20 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine may arrive. and, as it is necessary to administer two doses, we could immunize ten million Spaniards, “said Salvador Illa, in an interview with the program. The Hour of the 1 to RTVE.
Salvador Illa affirmed that the vaccine will be free and that the doses will be distributed by the National Health System. The prioritization of the vaccine will be defined according to “technical criteria” and with the recommendations of vaccination specialists, although the minister acknowledged that initially the vaccine will be aimed at risk groups.
Italy also expects to receive 3.4 million doses of the possible vaccine in January, a government source told Reuters on Tuesday.
Italy, one of the European countries most affected by the pandemic, will receive 13.6% of the first 200 million doses made available to the European Union, said the same source, provided that the European Medicines Agency (EMA) approves the vaccine in December. This initial supply can immunize 1.7 million Italians, as the vaccine requires an initial injection followed by a booster, which occurs 21 days later.
