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In an interview with CNN chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta, Bourla said he first learned of the trial results on Sunday and has yet to see the data, throwing water cold on the idea that there was a political motivation behind the publication of the news after voters. in the United States have chosen their presidential candidate.
Pfizer looked at the data several times during its vaccine trial, but it didn’t have enough infections in its test group to get meaningful data – until Sunday, Gupta reported. If anything, the data arrived earlier than expected: In October, Bourla commented in an open letter on Pfizer’s website, saying, “Based on our current trial recruiting and the dosage rate, we estimate that we will reach this milestone in the third week of November. “
The Trump administration was quick to take credit for the promising news from Pfizer. Vice President Mike Pence
tweeted that Pfizer’s development was “thanks to the public-private partnership forged by President Donald Trump”.
Still, Pfizer was not part of the Trump administration’s “Operation Warp Speed”, which urged drug companies to speed up their development of a vaccine against the coronavirus.
US federal government pledged $ 1.95 billion Pfizer (PFE) and partner BioNTech (BNTX) to help distribute the vaccine once it’s ready – but the government is not working directly to help its development.
Trump had called out the drug companies, urging them for new developments ahead of election day. He has explicitly told company CEOs that he would like to see a vaccine move faster than some of his health advisers have deemed reasonable, CNN reported.
Monday morning, President-elect Joe Biden
issued a statement hailing “the excellent news” and congratulating “the brilliant women and men who have contributed to this breakthrough”.
He added that “it is also important to understand that the end of the battle against Covid-19 is still months away” and “it will be several more months before there is widespread vaccination” in the United States.
Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the vaccine news from Pfizer bodes well for other Covid-19 vaccines in development and added that Pfizer was able to get results quickly due to the severity of the pandemic.
Make the vaccine
Although the vaccine is not intended for widespread administration anytime soon, Pfizer said it plans to seek emergency use authorization from the US Food and Drug Administration soon after the volunteers were monitored for two months. after their second dose of the vaccine.
Pfizer has at least three vaccine manufacturing sites in the United States, Gupta said. At the Kalamazoo, Michigan facility, there are several refrigerators – which run about the length of a football field – that are used to store the vaccine.
For months, companies have been battling to develop and eventually distribute an effective coronavirus vaccine. The race shows no signs of slowing down as companies continue to push their vaccine candidates through clinical trials, getting closer to determining which one will be considered safe and effective.
The vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna use new technology that has never been used in vaccines before, and experts say that in itself is a reason to be careful.
While the developments mean progress is being made, they won’t do much to alleviate the winter coronavirus surge in the short term given that it will be well until 2021 before the dose is available to all Americans.
CNN’s Maggie Fox, Sara Murray, and Kevin Liptak contributed to this report.
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