EU Commission Denies Political Agenda Behind COVID-19 Vaccines Authorization

MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 09th March, 2021) The European Commission caries out the review and green-lighting of vaccines against the coronavirus based on their efficacy and safety rather than any political considerations, EU spokesman Eric Mamer said on Monday.

"When it comes to the assessment process that the European Medicines Agency [EMA] takes on vaccines and market authorization, which then comes if EMA has given a positive assessment, the only consideration obviously is health-related, and it is related to the safety and the efficacy of any vaccine candidate," Mamer said at a briefing, when asked if the process of vaccine approval in the European Union was politically-motivated.

The spokesman noted that the bloc showed solidarity with the rest of the world through a set of assistance mechanisms, including the COVAX initiative, designed to ship up to 2 billion doses of coronavirus vaccines to low-income nations across the globe by the end of this year.

The European watchdog has so far green-lighted the use of vaccines developed by AstraZeneca/Oxford, Moderna, and Pfizer/BioNTech. However, the producers prompted dismay among the bloc's member states over cuts in deliveries which they claimed to be due to production capacity issues.

The European regulator is expected to authorize the vaccine developed by Johnson & Johnson firm later this month. Besides, it started a rolling review for Russia's Sputnik V vaccine, which ranks among the world's top three and is approved in over 40 countries across the world. In early February, the prestigious Lancet medical magazine published a study, confirming the vaccine efficacy at 91.6 percent.