The European Drug Administration updated the regulations on the 8th to allow six doses of each bottle of “Pfizer-Biotechnology” coronavirus vaccine for vaccination, one dose more than the previous regulations.
The new regulations are expected to accelerate the progress of vaccination in the European Union region.
On the same day, the European Commission announced that it had booked vaccine doses that could be vaccinated to 80% of the population in the European Union region.
One more dose
The coronavirus vaccine jointly developed by Pfizer Pharmaceuticals and German Biotech Company requires two doses at an interval of 21 days.
The European Drug Administration approved the use of the vaccine in the European Union on December 21 last year, requiring five doses per bottle of vaccine.
On January 8, EFDA announced an update of the “product information” of the vaccine, confirming that “each bottle contains six doses of vaccine” and indicating the specific syringe type needed to be used to extract six doses.
German Health Ministry spokesman Hanno Coates told media reporters on the same day that the adjustment will take effect immediately and increase the available dose of the vaccine in the EU region by 20%.
Pharmaceutical companies usually inject more vaccines in bottles than they need to do so to ensure that they can provide enough doses even if there is a loss such as spill, the Associated Press reported.
The Associated Press reported that the adjustment had previously been approved by the United States and the United Kingdom, and some doctors in the EU region were actually taking six doses per bottle; with the approval of the European Drug Administration, the vaccination progress of the 27 member states of the European Union is expected to accelerate.
EU countries have started to vaccinate the novel coronavirus vaccine since late December last year.
The Netherlands launched on the 6th of this month, which is the last EU member state to initiate vaccination.
Sufficient
On the 8th, the European Commission announced an agreement with Pfizer and Biotech to double the dose of the “Pfizer-Biotech” vaccine ordered by the European Union to 600 million doses.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said at a press conference on the same day that the European Union had previously ordered 300 million doses of Pfizer-Biotechnology vaccine, and “it has now reached an agreement with Bio-New Technology and Pfizer to buy another 300 million doses of vaccine”.
Von der Leyen said that 75 million doses of newly ordered vaccines can be delivered in the second quarter of this year, and the rest can be delivered in the third and fourth quarters.
The European Commission said later that the European Union proposed to member states to buy 200 million doses of newly ordered vaccine first, and another 100 million doses if necessary.
Coupled with the 160 million doses of vaccines previously ordered by Modena, the European Union has now ordered 760 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine.
Moderna’s vaccine was approved by the European Union for conditional listing on the 6th of this month.
Von der Leyen said that the EU has finalized the dose required for vaccination of 380 million people, more than 80% of the population in the EU region.
The population of the EU region is about 450 million.
