WASHINGTON (AP) – The United States plans to ship four million combined doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine to Mexico and Canada in its first shot export, the White House said Thursday.
Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the Biden administration is finalizing efforts to distribute 2.5 million doses in Mexico and 1.5 million in Canada as a “loan.” The details are still being worked out.
“Our first priority is to vaccinate the American population,” Psaki said in the daily briefing. But he added that “ensuring that our neighbors can contain the virus is a critical step in the mission, it is critical to ending the pandemic.”
The AstraZeneca vaccine has not been authorized for use in the United States, but by the World Health Organization. Tens of millions of doses have been stored in the United States in case they received emergency use authorization, causing an international outcry about the fact that life-saving doses were withheld when they could be used elsewhere.
Psaki said several nations have requested access to U.S. vaccines, but had nothing to add in other distributions.
Mexican Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard said via Twitter that Mexico was receiving the vaccine following talks between President Joe Biden and President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador earlier this month. “Good news!” He wrote.
“God bless the United States who will come to our rescue,” said Ontario Prime Minister Doug Ford, the leader of Canada’s most populous province. He thanked Biden for his willingness to share the vaccines.
“And once I get them, I’ll tell you champion, but first I have to get the delivery, so thank you. I appreciate it. We’ve been waiting. That’s what real neighbors do. They help each other in a crisis,” he said. . “We’ll take every vaccine you can give us, so that’s fabulous news.”
The Biden administration has said that once U.S. citizens are vaccinated, the next step is to ensure that Canada and Mexico can manage the pandemic so that borders can reopen.
Although the Canadian economy is closely interconnected with the United States, Washington has so far failed to allow any of the hundreds of millions of doses of vaccine manufactured in America to be exported, and Canada has had to resort to Europe and Asia.
Vaccine supply chain difficulties have forced Canada to extend the time between the first shot and the second by up to four months, so that everyone can be protected more quickly with the main dose. The hope is to get all adults to have at least one shot by the end of June.
Canadian regulators have approved Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, but acquiring them has proven difficult.
Canada ranks 20th in the number of doses administered, with more than 8% of the adult population getting at least one shot. This compares to almost 45% in the UK and almost 30% in the US. Mexico ranks approximately tenth in the number of doses administered, with 3.3% of the total population getting at least one shot.
AstraZeneca is among the vaccines that have received emergency approval in Mexico and Mexico already has 870,000 doses of this vaccine. It also features Pfizer, SinoVac and Sputnik V for a total of more than 8 million doses. A million doses of Hong Kong SinoVac arrived on Thursday.
The US storage of the AstraZeneca vaccine has also been controversial with other allies. The European Union, of 27 countries, had struggled to get closer to Biden by sharing vaccine supplies to prevent the disease abroad, which would not only help save lives, but also improve global economic growth.
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Sherman reported from Mexico City and Gillies from Toronto.