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The first batches of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine against covid-19 destined for European Union countries left the Belgian factory in Puurs, where they are manufactured, this Wednesday, after the green light on Monday by the European authorities .
A France-Presse journalist at the scene found three refrigerated trucks leaving the industrial zone of US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, in northeast Belgium, between 9 a.m. and 10 a.m. Wednesday morning.
The operation, which used the logistical means of the Belgian transport company H. Essers, was carried out under close police surveillance, two police vehicles escorting each truck after loading, with the media kept at a safe distance.
The first trips had already been made at the beginning of December from Puurs to the United Kingdom, after the approval of the British health authority, while today the vaccination campaign in Switzerland began.
Questioned by AFP, Pfizer refused to clarify which EU populations the batches were destined for, with one of the trucks with Polish registration.
The European Commission announced on Monday the authorization for the distribution in the EU of Pfizer-BioNTech’s covid-19 vaccine, hours after the green light from the European Medicines Agency.
The EU had previously announced that the first vaccinations would start between December 27 and 29 in all member states.
The distribution, which will begin in January and extend through 2021, will be proportional to the population of nations.
The covid-19 pandemic caused at least 1,718,209 deaths derived from more than 77.9 million cases of contagion worldwide, according to a report prepared by the French agency AFP.
The disease is transmitted by a new coronavirus detected at the end of December 2019 in Wuhan, a city in central China.
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