BRUSSELS – Reuters – AstraZeneca Plc informed European Union officials on Friday that delivery of the COVID-19 vaccine to the group would be reduced by 60% to 31 million doses in the first quarter of the year, a senior official told Reuters.
The decline is another blow to the COVID-19 vaccination rate in Europe after Pfizer Inc and partner BioNTech SE this week delayed the supply of their vaccine to the block and said the move was necessary due to work to stop production increase.
AstraZeneca is expected to deliver about 80 million doses to the 27 EU countries by the end of March, the official involved in the talks said.
The official added that AstraZeneca plans to start delivery to the EU from 15 February, in line with the original plans.
The company confirmed the decline in deliveries without giving specifics on the extent of the shortfall.
“Initial volumes will be lower than originally expected due to lower yields at a manufacturing site in our European supply chain,” a spokeswoman for AstraZeneca said in a written statement.
“We are going to deliver tens of millions of doses to the European Union in February and March as we continue to increase production volumes,” he said of the vaccine being developed with Oxford University.
The drug manufacturer in Britain also agreed to deliver more than 80 million doses in the second quarter. The EU official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said on Friday that the company was unable to deliver updated delivery targets for the period April to June due to production issues.
AstraZeneca told EU officials at a meeting that the cuts were due to production problems at a vaccine factory in Belgium run by its partner Novasep, the EU official said. Novasep was not immediately available for comment.
EU governments “have expressed deep dissatisfaction with this,” EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides said after the announcement on Twitter.
The EU Drug Regulator must decide on the approval of AstraZeneca’s vaccine on 29 January. He has already received an emergency permit in Britain.
The EU has an agreement to buy at least 300 million doses of AstraZeneca, with an option for an extra 100 million, as part of the company’s global commitments to deliver more than 3 billion doses.
Reporting by Francesco Guarascio in Brussels; additional reporting by Ludwig Burger in Frankfurt; Edited by Chris Reese and Bill Berkrot