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- President Donald Trump and his son Donald Trump Jr. on Monday accused Pfizer of having deliberately waited until after the US election to announce the first promising results of its COVID-19 vaccine trials on Monday.
- Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla told CNN on Monday that Pfizer simply released the results “when science told us the data was available.”
- Although the announcement came on Monday from Pfizer, and not from a government organization, Trump speculated on Twitter that Democrats and even the US Food and Drug Administration “didn’t want me to get a WIN vaccine, before the election. “
- The younger Trump suggested the timing for Pfizer’s advanced trial results, which suggested the company’s vaccine was over 90% effective, was “bad.”
- Visit the Business Insider homepage for more stories.
President Donald Trump and his son Donald Trump Jr. claimed on Monday that Pfizer deliberately waited until after the U.S. election to announce promising first results from the advanced stage clinical trial of its COVID-19 vaccine.
They provided no evidence for their claims.
Pfizer said on Monday that its experimental coronavirus vaccine has passed the last stage of clinical trials: the shot has been shown to be over 90% effective in preventing COVID-19, the company said, a milestone in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
Trump and his son took to Twitter to speculate on the timing of Pfizer’s announcement, made six days after election day.
Although it was Pfizer who made the announcement, Trump tweeted Monday night attacking the Food and Drug Administration and the Democrats in the United States, who he said “didn’t want me to get a WIN vaccine, before the election.”
He added that Pfizer “did not have the courage” to issue the statement earlier.
A Pfizer spokesperson told Business Insider the timing had nothing to do with the election.
—Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 10, 2020
Young Trump called the timing of Pfizer’s announcement “pretty amazing” and suggested he thought the timing was “bad.”
—Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) November 9, 2020
The president previously said a vaccine would be ready on election day. In mid-October, Pfizer announced plans to submit its COVID-19 vaccine for FDA clearance in late November.
Trump too tweeted that if President-elect Joe Biden had been in the White House, “you wouldn’t have the vaccine for another four years, and the FDA would never have approved it so quickly.”
Read more: Prepare for the most dangerous 73 days of Trump’s presidency
The data Pfizer announced on Monday comes from an analysis that took place while its coronavirus vaccine trial is still ongoing. The analysis was carried out by an independent group of scientists responsible for monitoring the trial. Outside scientists performed their analysis on November 8 and informed Pfizer of the results that day.
Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla was first briefed on the results of the trial on Sunday, he told CNN in an interview on Monday, adding that he had yet to see the data himself. even.
Although Pfizer looked at the data several times throughout the trial, it didn’t have enough infections in its test group to draw meaningful conclusions until Sunday, Bourla said.
When asked about the “remarkable” timing of the results after screening, Bourla said Pfizer simply released them “when science told us the data was available.”
A Pfizer spokesperson told Business Insider that the timing “didn’t have to do with the election.”
Pfizer originally planned to conduct the analysis after 32 people in the trial became ill with COVID-19. However, after discussions with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the company decided to delay this analysis, leading it after at least 62 people fell ill, the company said on Monday. Pfizer did not say why it made the change.
By the time outside experts analyzed the study, 94 people had fallen ill, mostly among those who had received a placebo, instead of the effective vaccine. The results showed that Pfizer’s vaccine was over 90% effective in preventing the coronavirus, Pfizer said.
Bourla had repeatedly referred to the prospects of his company providing data on coronavirus vaccines in October. In September, he appeared on CBS’s “Today” and “Face The Nation” to predict “we’ll have an answer by the end of October”.
Pfizer’s ambitious schedule aligned with President Donald Trump’s repeated predictions of getting a vaccine shot before election day, but that did not materialize.
Trump celebrated Pfizer announcement
Trump’s tweets on Monday night contrasted starkly with previous ones he had sent about Pfizer’s announcement throughout the day.
He had called the test results “SUCH BIG NEWS!”
—Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 9, 2020
Vice President Mike Pence also tweeted about the development, though he mistakenly portrayed Pfizer’s milestone as an achievement of the Trump administration.
Pence tweeted that Pfizer developed its vaccine “thanks to the public-private partnership forged by President Trump.”
While the US government placed a large order over the summer for Pfizer’s vaccine, the company was never part of Operation Warp Speed, the government’s initiative to accelerate development and distribution. of a vaccine, and Pfizer said it had never taken government money. US government to help his research.
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