A medical worker prepares a dose of the Oxford / AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine at a vaccination center in Antwerp, Belgium, on March 18, 2021. REUTERS / Yves Herman
Israel no longer wants AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine (AZN.L) and is exploring with the company whether a large container could be sent into the pipeline elsewhere, the Israeli pandemic coordinator said Wednesday.
“We are trying to find the best solution. After all, we don’t want (the vaccines) to get here and we have to throw them in the trash,” official Nachman Ash told Army Radio, which he said Israel’s needs were met by other suppliers.
In his remarks, Ash made no reference to the AstraZeneca vaccine being associated with very rare blood clots in Europe. Many countries re-administered it after the European Union drug watchdog said the benefits outweighed the risks.
Last year, Israel launched a wide-ranging network as it tried to secure vaccine doses at the height of the pandemic and was pre-ordered by several companies.
It was largely established in the Pfizer (PFE.N) / BioNTech (22UAy.DE) vaccine, launching one of the fastest launches in the world. COVID-19 infections in Israel have plummeted and the economy has reopened.
Israel is also buying Modern COVID-19 (MRNA.O) vaccines, which use a similar messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. Read more
Ash said with safe supplies until 2022, Israel no longer needed the 10 million doses it agreed to buy from AstraZeneca.
“They can certainly be used elsewhere in the world. At the moment, we are trying to find, together with the company, the best way to do it,” he said.
“We think it would be best if they (the vaccines) didn’t come to Israel and we agree with the company on some kind of way to divert them to other places.”
AstraZeneca officials made no immediate comment.
About 81% of Israeli citizens or residents over the age of 16 – the age group eligible for the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine in Israel – have received both doses.
Some 167,000 of the 5.2 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Islamist Gaza in Hamas have had at least one dose of vaccine, with supplies from Israel, Russia, the United Arab Emirates, the global vaccine-sharing program COVAX and China.
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