The European Commission announced on Friday reaching its first agreement with the multinational pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca on purchasing a potential vaccine against the coronavirus and also distributing it to countries in need
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th August, 2020) The European Commission announced on Friday reaching its first agreement with the multinational pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca on purchasing a potential vaccine against the coronavirus and also distributing it to countries in need.
"Today, the European Commission has reached a first agreement with the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca to purchase a potential vaccine against COVID-19 as well as to donate to lower and middle income countries or re-direct to other European countries ... The Commission now has agreed the basis for a contractual framework for the purchase of 300 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, with an option to purchase 100 million more, on behalf of EU Member States. The Commission continues discussing similar agreements with other vaccine manufacturers," the commission said in a press release.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen praised the deal as "the first cornerstone in implementing the European Commission's Vaccines Strategy."
Following the Phase I/II clinical trials of the vaccine candidate, it has provided "promising results" regarding safety and immunogenicity, the European Commission said, adding that the decision to support this exact vaccine candidate was based on many factors, including technologies used, delivery speed, cost, risk sharing and large production capacity.
