Former Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration Scott Gottlieb Aimed at the federal government on Friday for allegedly withholding Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine.
“They are being throttled, and I think the government has admitted that they are,” Gottlieb said in a morning interview on MSNBC. “In part, they say they want to withhold a second dose for everyone who gets a first dose. I don’t think that’s the right decision. I think they should lean over and try to get more doses in humans now, and they can be sure that production will keep up. “
Several governors complained this week that their states did not receive shipments of Pfizer’s vaccine they expected, including those in Florida, Illinois and Washington. Pfizer said in a statement Thursday that “millions” of doses of the vaccine were available, but it had received no shipping orders from the federal government.
Gottlieb, who served as FDA Commissioner from 2017-19 and currently sits on Pfizer’s board of directors, said he believed the FBI was trying to “ manage ” the offering, noting that the Department of Health and Human Services acknowledged that 7 million doses of the vaccine were on hand.
“There will be many more by the end of this weekend,” said Gottlieb. ‘They could ship many more than they are. I think they are trying to manage the supply chain. I think they are trying to get Moderna and Pfizer right. I think they might be concerned that if they put too much vaccine into the supply chain, some of it might go unused.
“I’m not sure what they think,” he added. This is what I would speculate as to why they do that. My advice would be to get as many weapons as possible now, because we are now at the height of the epidemic, or entering the peak. “
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D) said Wednesday that he believed the cut meant it would take much longer for Americans to get the vaccine than originally thought.
“This development is likely to cut our state’s planned Pfizer shipments by about half this month,” Pritzker said. “The same goes for the rest of the country.”
Watch above via MSNBC.
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