Pascal Soriot, CEO of AstraZeneca.
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AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot has defended his delay in the deployment of the coronavirus vaccine in the EU, claiming that the drug manufacturer is “working 24/7” to solve production problems. But he also noted that the EU had ordered three months later than the UK, but that meant it was lagging behind in dealing with supply problems.
The EU has reacted angrily to a delay in AstraZeneca’s supply of the coronavirus vaccine, which is expected to be approved by the European drug regulator over the weekend on the block.
The 27-member bloc expected about 80 million doses of punctures by the end of March, but now only about 31 million doses are received. As member states struggle to gain access to vaccines and releases, the EU has said it could limit exports of EU-manufactured Covid-19 vaccines.
Speaking to the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, Soriot said delays in the supply of the coronavirus vaccine were caused by several production problems.
“We think we’ve solved those issues, but we’re basically two months back where we wanted to be,” he said.
The British-Swedish pharmacist had also experienced “teething problems like this in the UK supply chain,” Soriot noted, however, as the UK contract was signed three months before the European vaccine agreement. , the company “had an additional three months to fix all the bugs we experienced.”
However, he said AstraZeneca still planned to deliver a good portion of the promised vaccines to the EU in February. “But, you know, if we deliver in February what we plan to deliver, it’s not a small volume. We’re planning to deliver millions of doses to Europe, it’s not small,” he told the newspaper.
A Brazilian doctor voluntarily receives an injection as part of the phase 3 trials of a vaccine developed by Oxford University and the British pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca in July 2020.
Nelson Almeida | AFP | Getty Images
Asked how much he could expect to receive from the EU, Soriot said that as soon as the vaccine is approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), we will send at least 3 million doses immediately to Europe, and then we will have another shipping about a week later and then the third or fourth week of February. And the goal is to administer 17 million doses before February. “
“It’s not as good as we’d like, but it’s not really as bad,” he said. Globally, Soriot said production capacity would be 100 million doses as of February.
Anger in the EU
Talks were held between AstraZeneca and the EU on Monday, after which EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides said the discussions “resulted in dissatisfaction with the lack of clarity and insufficient explanations”.
The EU has asked AstraZeneca to provide it with a detailed vaccine delivery plan and when the distribution will take place, with future discussions set for Wednesday.
Some countries, including Italy, have threatened legal action against AstraZeneca for the delay. Others have questioned why the UK, which is heavily dependent on AstraZeneca’s spike in its vaccination launch, has advanced its vaccination drive and has not yet experienced a shortage of supply. It has immunized more than 6.8 million people, with at least a first dose of a two-dose vaccine.
Soriot said the UK production plant was more productive and insisted there was no anti-EU context.
“First of all, we have different plants and they have different yields and different productivity. One of the highest yielding plants is in the UK because it started earlier. It also had its own problems, but we solved them all, good productivity. , but it is the UK plant because it started earlier. “
“We don’t do it on purpose. I’m European, I have Europe at heart. Our president is Swedish, he’s European. Our CFO is European. A lot of people in management are European. So we want to treat Europe as best we can. “
He noted that the drug manufacturer had a kind of agreement on the “best effort” with the EU, as it had wanted to supply it at the same time as the UK, although it subsequently requested the vaccine. “By the way, we didn’t commit to the EU. It’s not a commitment we have to Europe: it’s the best effort.”
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson, puts up a photograph with a bottle of the AstraZeneca / Oxford University Covid-19 candidate vaccine.
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Production and scaling problems
With a coronavirus vaccine developed, clinically tested and approved in less than a year, Soriot said it was natural to experience technical problems in the upload process.
“We’re scaling up to hundreds of millions, billions of doses of vaccines at a very high rate. A year ago, we didn’t have a vaccine. When you do that, you have technical issues, you have scaling issues.” he said, adding that there were current problems with the production of the vaccine in two European plants.
“For Europe, the pharmacological substance is produced essentially in two plants, one in the Netherlands, one in Belgium. The pharmaceutical product is actually produced in Italy and Germany. Therefore, from the point of view of the pharmaceutical product, we have full capacity We have no problem The current problems have to do with the manufacture of the substance of the drug, “he said.