(Reuters) – At the request of the federal government, Pfizer Inc. has maintained second doses for each of its COVID-19 vaccinations and expects no problems delivering them to Americans, a spokesman said in a statement Friday.
Pfizer’s remarks contradict a report in the Washington Post that the federal government scrapped its vaccine reserve at the end of December and has no reserves of doses on hand.
“Operation Warp Speed has asked us to send second doses only recently,” the spokesman said. “As a result, we have all the second doses of previous shipments available to the US.”
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to requests for comment.
Pfizer has shipped more than 15 million doses to destinations in the United States, primarily from its Michigan plant, and expects to be able to produce approximately 2 billion doses worldwide by 2021, the spokesman said.
However, the United States is struggling to deliver the scattered shots. Only about 12 million of the more than 31 million doses administered were administered according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Scattered vaccine shortages were reported Friday at the forefront of the U.S. fight against the coronavirus pandemic, which has prompted at least one major health care system to cancel a string of appointments of people hoping to be vaccinated.
Earlier Friday, Pfizer announced that from the end of January to the beginning of February, there will be a temporary impact on transport to European countries due to changes in manufacturing processes to increase production. [L1N2JQ0V3]
About nine of the 27 governments in the European Union complained at a meeting this week about ‘inadequate doses’, a participant said.
Reported by Carl O’Donnell; Edited by Leslie Adler and Sonya Hepinstall