Pfizer begins exporting COVID plans made in the US: Report | Business and Economic News

Pfizer’s first doses of COVID-19 shots fired in the U.S. were sent to Mexico as pressure increases in the U.S. to help other countries.

Pfizer Inc.’s shipment of its COVID-19 vaccine to Mexico includes doses taken at a U.S. plant this week, the first of a series of ongoing exports of U.S. firing, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters. agency.

The first shipment of the vaccine, created at Pfizer’s Kalamazoo plant in Michigan state, is delivered by pharmacists overseas from U.S. facilities after the end of the Trump-era dose-reduction export in late March, the source said Thursday.

The U.S. government has come under heavy pressure in recent weeks to provide surplus vaccines to other nations in dire need as it moves forward rapidly by inserting its neighbors. Many countries where the virus is still widespread are making efforts to obtain vaccine supplies to help tame the pandemic.

Wealthy governments have tried to supply Pfizer and Moderna Inc. with COVID-19 shots due to their very high efficiency and safety issues and production issues that have temporarily sidelined vaccines from AstraZeneca Plc and Johnson & Johnson.

Pfizer has shipped more than 10 million doses to Mexico so far and has become the largest supplier of COVID-19 vaccine.

German partners Pfizer and BioNTech SE have supplied doses to other countries from its main European production plant in Belgium.

The Mexican Ministry of Health said this week Pfizer is receiving two million doses. He has received more than a million doses from Belgium since Wednesday and expects another million this week. Reuters has been unable to confirm that all remaining Pfizer doses will come from Michigan.

Pfizer will use the additional capacity at U.S. facilities to deliver shots overseas while it continues to meet its U.S. supply commitment, the source said, adding that the drug manufacturer will also make shipments from Belgium.

Excess supplies

Pfizer said it will shoot 25 million shots a week in the U.S. for half a year, which is more than it needs to meet its commitment to deliver 300 million doses to the U.S. by the end of July.

The company expects to produce 2.521 billion vaccine doses by 2021 and already has agreements to supply more than a billion to governments around the world.

Pfizer has shipped more than 10 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine to Mexico so far, becoming its largest supplier [File: Henry Romero/Reuters]

A deal signed by Pfizer last year with the White House prevented the U.S. from sending doses to other countries until March 31, according to a source and a U.S. official, who denied it because he did not have permission to speak. media.

The U.S. vaccination campaign has been one of the fastest and most successful in the world, with nearly 240 million shots fired so far at more than 140 million people, according to federal data updated Thursday.

The White House said Monday it would export 60 million doses of AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, which was made at a U.S. facility, to countries in need.

Officials said Monday that the U.S. no longer anticipates the need for an AstraZeneca vaccine to meet the goal of having enough shots for all Americans in the summer in the northern hemisphere.

The U.S. government said on Sunday it would immediately ship raw materials for COVID-19 vaccines, medical equipment and protective equipment to India as it became the latest epicenter of the pandemic as its health system collapsed. He has not yet ordered the end of the vaccination shipment to India.