AstraZeneca will deliver nine million additional doses to the EU in the coming weeks

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced this Sunday that pharmaceutical AstraZeneca will deliver nine million additional doses of its coronavirus vaccine. In the coming weeks.

“Step forward in vaccines. AstraZeneca will deliver an additional nine million doses in the first quarter (40 million in total) compared to last week’s supply and will begin delivery one week ahead of schedule.Von der Leyen wrote on Twitter.

Von der Leyen, who today held a virtual meeting with the CEO of AstraZeneca and other pharmaceutical companies that have agreements with the EU on the purchase of coronavirus vaccines, added that “The company will also expand its production capacity in Europe.”

Last Friday, the European Commission authorized the EU-wide commercialization of the vaccine against COVID-19, developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford., which had received technical approval hours earlier from the European Medicines Agency (EMA) for its administration in people over 18 years of age.

These vaccines are the third party to receive conditional consent within the block after that of BioNTech Y Pfizer and from Modern, which were approved in December and early January respectively.

This vaccine, that one efficacy of approximately 60% in the clinical studies analyzed, It should be given in two standard doses, with the second injection given 4 to 12 weeks after the first.

The European Union reserved access to 300 million doses of the AstraZeneca and Oxford vaccine in August (and the possibility to acquire an additional 100 million), but the authorization comes in full conflict between Brussels and society, which announced last week that it could deliver only a quarter of the doses promiseds for the first quarter due to production problems.

The explanations the company has since given have not convinced the Community Executive, who, for example, has demanded that the agreement be respected. sent vaccines from plants that the laboratory in the UK has.

Further, Brussels suspects that AstraZeneca has sold doses produced in the EU to third countries and this Friday has started an export surveillance system that allows you to block deliveries of doses outside the EU if a pharmaceutical company fails to fulfill its delivery obligations.

(With information from EFE and Europa Press)

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