November 20 According to a report by Singapore’s Lianhe Zaobao, on the 19th local time, European Commission President Feng der Leyen said that the European Union may grant conditional sales licenses for two coronavirus vaccines in late December, so the European Union is expected to start distributing vaccines “synchronously” with the United States.
According to reports, von der Leyen said that the European Drug Administration may grant conditional licenses to the coronavirus vaccine jointly developed by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, as early as late December, and the coronavirus vaccine of the American pharmaceutical company Modena.
Von der Leyen said that the European Drug Administration maintains daily communication with the Food and Drug Administration to “synchronize” the evaluation of vaccines.
Previously, it was reported that Pfizer would apply for emergency use authorization in the United States on the 20th. Frontline healthcare workers in the U.S. are expected to be vaccinated against the first coronavirus by late December 2020 or early January 2021.
According to Reuters, citing unnamed EU officials, the EU may spend more than $10 billion to purchase hundreds of millions of doses of vaccines developed by Pfizer and CureVac, a German vaccine research and development company. According to the report, the European Union agreed to buy Pfizer’s candidate vaccine at about $18.3 per dose, which is lower than that of the United States.
At present, as the weather begins to cool down, many countries in Europe have experienced a new wave of severe pandemic, and governments have implemented new blockade measures. EU leaders held a videoconference on the evening of the 19th to discuss the fight against the novel coronavirus pandemic, emphasizing strengthening coordination in rapid testing, vaccination and other aspects.
