White House says it’s working to speed up early production of J&J COVID-19 vaccine

World news

Denmark Nadeem

Rebecca spalding

Julie steenhuysen

(Reuters) – The Biden administration is exploring all options to ramp up manufacturing of Johnson & Johnson’s COVID-19 vaccine, which is under regulatory review, and said on Friday that currently expected levels of early doses were below expectations.

The White House invoked the Defense Production Act to help Pfizer Inc speed up production of COVID-19 vaccine and that “all options” were on the table to produce more Johnson & Johnson vaccine if allowed.

It will also use the powers of war to ramp up home testing for COVID-19 and make more surgical gloves in the United States, officials said at a press briefing on Friday.

“As is the case with other vaccines, we haven’t found that the level of manufacture allows us to have as many vaccines as we think we need to come out of the gate,” said Andy Slavitt, advisor. principal of the White House COVID-19. intervention team, with reference to the J&J vaccine.

J&J applied for emergency use authorization in the United States on Thursday. He expects some vaccines to be ready for distribution as soon as they are authorized, but he did not say how many.

Emerging Biosolutions CEO Robert Kramer said in an interview on Friday that the company is currently manufacturing a bulk drug substance for J&J “on a large scale.” Emergent only produces vaccines in bulk, which are then placed in syringes or vials and packaged for shipment by another contractor.

Kramer said they are on track to make enough product for hundreds of millions of doses per year. It is not known what other supply bottlenecks may be. Kramer said his company had already benefited from the Defense Production Act under the Trump administration, which helped the company get to the point where it is ready to go.

Under the Defense Production Act, the government will prioritize two components important to Pfizer’s vaccine production – filling pumps and tangential flow filtration units, officials said.

“We told you that when we hear of a bottleneck on the necessary equipment, supplies or technology related to vaccine supply, we step in and help, and that’s exactly what we do. Said Tim Manning, the supply chain coordinator for COVID-19 Response.

The government will also invoke its powers under the Defense Production Act to increase COVID-19 home testing with six unnamed manufacturers, with the goal of producing 61 million tests by the summer, Manning said. .

He will also invoke his powers to increase the country’s supply of surgical gloves, which are made almost exclusively abroad.

Manning said the government would build factories that make the raw materials for the surgical gloves and help build factories in the United States to make the gloves.

By the end of the year, he said, the United States would be able to produce one billion gloves per month.

Officials said once J & J’s vaccine is cleared, it will mean millions more doses will be available to states. The vaccine is single-dose, unlike the two-dose vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna Inc., and can be stored in the refrigerator.

Officials hoped that the ease of giving the J&J vaccine will allow states to vaccinate residents more quickly.