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The founders of the company that developed the first WHO-approved COVID-19 vaccine have warned that there will be supply gaps until more vaccines are rolled out.
In an interview with German magazine Der Spiegel, BioNTech CEO Uğur Şahin said his company was working with partner Big Pharma Pfizer to try to make up for the expected vaccine shortfall.
“At the moment things don’t look rosy, there is a hole because there are no other approved vaccines and we have to fill this gap with our vaccine. This is also the reason why we are working now with Pfizer on whether and how we can produce even more, ”said Şahin.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) is expected to approve a vaccine from pharmaceutical company Moderna on January 6, while German Health Minister Jens Spahn also urged the EMA to quickly approve a vaccine developed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca which the UK authorized this week.
The EU is dismayed by the slow pace of vaccination. Thursday, the French Minister of Health Olivier Véran promised to ramp up the country’s vaccination campaign after being criticized for being slow.
Şahin admitted that the process in Europe was “not as quick and easy as in other countries”. He criticized the EU’s decision to split orders between different manufacturers in the hope that more vaccines would be approved quickly.
“There was a hypothesis that many other companies would come up with vaccines. Apparently the impression prevailed: we’ll have enough, it won’t be that bad, and we have it under control. I was amazed.” , Şahin said. While the United States bought around 600 million doses of the BioNTech / Pfizer vaccine in July, it took the EU until November to order half of it.
This article is part of POLITICOPremium Police Service from: Pro Health Care. Whether it’s the prices of medicines, EMAs, vaccines, pharmaceuticals and more, our specialist journalists keep you up to date on the topics that drive the healthcare policy agenda. E-mail [email protected] for a free trial.
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