European Commission Denies AstraZeneca and J&J Vaccine Contract Rumors

Rumors are circulating in Europe that the European Commission (EC) will decline to renew its COVID-19 vaccine contracts with AstraZeneca (AZ) and Johnson & Johnson (J&J) once they expire, and a commission spokesperson has given a less-than ringing endorsement of the vaccines.

“We keep all options open to be prepared for the next stages of the pandemic, for 2022 and beyond,” an EC spokesperson told FDAnews. “We can, however, not comment on contractual issues.”

The trade bloc is reportedly planning to give up on the two adenoviral-vector vaccines in favor of Pfizer/BioNTech’s and Moderna’s mRNA vaccines.

The EU is currently in negotiations with Pfizer on a massive 1.8 billion vaccine-dose contract extension, according to commission president Ursula von der Leyen, who has called for concentrating on obtaining mRNA vaccines.

“We need to focus now on technologies that have proven their worth,” she said. “mRNA vaccines are a clear case in point.”

Vaccinations with Pfizer/BioNTech’s and Moderna’s two-dose inoculations have gone off without a hitch, and the two companies have delivered steady supplies of their vaccines to the trade bloc. By contrast, both AZ’s and J&J’s vaccines have raised concerns after cases of rare blood clots were reported in a very small number of patients. Denmark decided not to use the AZ vaccine after the incidents, and other member states have imposed age restrictions.

Inoculations with J&J’s vaccine are currently on hold in both the U.S. and Europe as adverse events of very rare blood clots in six U.S. patients are being evaluated. The inoculation pauses have occurred just as J&J  has begun shipping doses to the EU (DID, April 13).

AZ has also caused frustration in the EU over its failure to meet its supply commitments on time. Thierry Breton, the trade bloc’s commissioner for the internal market, slammed the company as the main reason Europe’s vaccine rollout started off slowly compared to those in the U.S. and UK. — James Miessler