Workers move boxes containing the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine while they are ready to be shipped to the Pfizer Global Supply Kalamazoo manufacturing plant in Kalamazoo, Michigan on December 13, 2020.
Morry Gash | AFP | Getty Images
Officials with Operation Warp Speed, the U.S. government’s program to distribute Covid-19 vaccines to Americans, had to reduce the amount of doses for several states due to confusion about the certificate’s analysis. of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for vaccine rounds.
The federal government’s mistake disrupted vaccination distribution plans in at least 14 states and frustrated state governors and health officials who said they were caught by surprise when they learned of shipment deficiencies.
Operation Warp Speed has allocated 2 million doses of Pfizer vaccine for next week’s shipment, after the U.S. sent 2.9 million doses last week. Officials also plan to ship 5.9 million doses of Modern vaccine this week.
Dr. Moncef Slaoui, chief adviser to Operation Warp Speed, said the agency erroneously assumed the Pfizer vaccine was ready to be shipped when there was actually a two-day delay period in which the FDA required a certificate of analysis of each set of vaccines.
“This lag period has led to differences in the plan and what was actually done,” Slaoui said Sunday in an interview with CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We’ve addressed that and optimized what we do every day.”
The FDA requires a certificate of analysis for each round of Pfizer vaccines at least 48 hours prior to distribution, but does not require review of the certificate prior to shipment. The certificate includes the results of quality control tests and is required with the use of Pfizer emergency authorization according to the FDA.
GlaxoSmithKline pharmaceutical executive Moncef Slaoui, who will serve as chief adviser on finding a vaccine against the coronavirus disease pandemic (COVID-19), speaks as President Donald Trump listens during a disease response event of the coronavirus in the White House Rock Garden in Washington.
Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
Operation Warp Speed’s operations general, General Gustave Perna, who is in charge of logistics for sending the vaccines, apologized repeatedly on Saturday for minor vaccine deliveries and claimed responsibility for the “error of planning “.
“The mistake I made is not understanding exactly (again my responsibility) all the steps that need to be taken to make sure the vaccine is releasable,” Perna told a news conference.
The states that will experience a lower number of doses than expected are Washington, New Jersey, Virginia, Idaho, Michigan, Connecticut, California, Nevada, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Vermont, Massachusetts, Iowa and Oregon.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said Thursday that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention informed him that the allocation of vaccines for his state was reduced by 40 percent and that other states would have similar deficits.
General Gustave Perna, head of operations for the Department of Defense’s Warp Speed Project, speaks during a White House press conference on the Coronavirus Task Force in the White House James Brady press conference room on 19 November 2020 in Washington, DC.
Tasos Katopodis | Getty Images News | Getty Images
“This is disturbing and frustrating. We need predictable and accurate numbers to plan and ensure success on the ground,” Inslee wrote in a tweet. “No explanation given.”
Pfizer spokeswoman Kim Bencker told CNBC in an email statement following Perna’s apology that the company has millions of doses in warehouses ready for shipment once the company receives confirmation of the Operation Warp Speed.
“We remain confident in our ability to deliver up to 50 million doses worldwide this year and up to 1.3 billion next year,” Bencker said.
U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams said vaccine deployment will be the most difficult vaccination program in history and warned that there will be inconsistencies in the number of doses planned and in what is actually allocated.
“This will be the most technically and logistically most difficult vaccination project of all time,” Adams said Sunday in an interview with CBS’s “Face The Nation”. “We started slowly and will continue to grow. The American people should have hope about vaccines, but we also need to be vigilant.”
– Noah Higgins-Dunn of CNBC contributed to the reports