“If we have a surplus, we will share it with the rest of the world,” he said. Biden told reporters Wednesday and generally talked about the U.S. vaccine supply. “We’re going to make sure Americans are cared for first.”
Johnson & Johnson, which has permission for the vaccine in the United States but has fallen behind on its production targets in the United States and Europe, recently asked the United States to lend 10 million doses to the European Union, but the government of Praying also denies it according to US and European officials.
What you need to know about rolling out vaccines
The European Union has come under heavy criticism for “vaccine nationalism” and protectionism, which intensified last week when Italy blocked a small amount of doses to Australia, which intensified a tug of war over much-needed shots. Nevertheless, over the past few weeks, the European Union has exported 34 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to dozens of countries, even though it has been in short supply at home.
While frustrations are simmering, some European officials are blaming the United States. European Council President Charles Michel said the United States, along with Britain, “imposed a direct ban on the export of vaccines or vaccine components into its territory.” Asked on Thursday about the US offering of the AstraZeneca vaccine, White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters that vaccine manufacturers are free to export their products made in the United States while also complying with the terms of their contracts with the government.
But because AstraZeneca’s vaccine was produced using the Defense Production Act, Mr. Please approve the delivery of doses abroad. Such a move could have major negative political consequences, as long as Americans continue to seek shots.
AstraZeneca is also likely to want liability protection for doses sent overseas, such as in the United States when the vaccine is cleared.
Meanwhile, regulators in the United States are awaiting new AstraZeneca data, expected in the next few weeks, from a Phase 3 trial that enrolled 32,000 participants mostly in the United States. AstraZeneca is unlikely to report the results of an early investigation into its data, as other vaccine manufacturers have done. It will instead wait for more statistically significant results after trial participants were longer monitored for side effects and more people in the vaccine and placebo groups became ill, federal officials said. Experts believe that the vaccine is unlikely to carry a higher efficacy rate than the survey conducted by Johnson & Johnson, which uses a similar technology and requires only one dose.