Covid-19 Vaccine

Albert Bourla, CEO of Pfizer, stated that a third dose of the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine is "likely" needed within 12 months in order to get fully vaccinated.

“A likely scenario is that there will be likely a need for a third dose, somewhere between six and 12 months and then from there, there will be an annual revaccination, but all of that needs to be confirmed. And again, the variants will play a key role,” so Bourla.

Denmark has removed the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine from its vaccination program, saying it is not needed because the country has already reached "such an advanced point" in its vaccine rollout.

The Danish Health Authority said studies had shown a higher than expected frequency of blood clots following doses, affecting about one in 40,000 people.

Johnson & Johnson has announced Tuesday it will "proactively delay the rollout of our vaccine in Europe" after six women in the US developed a rare disorder involving blood clots.

"The safety and well-being of the people who use our products is our number one priority. We are aware of an extremely rare disorder involving people with blood clots in combination with low platelets in a small number of individuals who have received our Covid-19 vaccine. The United States Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are reviewing data involving six reported US cases out of more than 6.8 million doses administered. Out of an abundance of caution, the CDC and FDA have recommended a pause in the use of our vaccine," the company said. "In addition, we have been reviewing these cases with European health authorities. We have made the decision to proactively delay the rollout of our vaccine in Europe. We have been working closely with medical experts and health authorities, and we strongly support the open communication of this information to healthcare professionals and the public."

India's Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) has approved use of Russia's Sputnik V Coronavirus vaccine. India is said to produce 750 million doses of the Russian vaccine.

"India, the world’s 2nd most populous nation, became the 60th country to register #SputnikV after positive results of local Phase 3 clinical study. Sputnik V is now authorized in 60 countries with a population of over 3 [billion] people," the Sputnik V official Twitter account wrote.

The European Medicines Agency announced Friday that it is reviewing a possible connection between the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine and blood clots, Reuters reports.

"Four serious cases of rare blood clots with low platelets, one of which was fatal, have been reported after inoculation with J&J’s vaccine from its Janssen unit, the European Medicines Agency’s (EMA) said," Reuters wrote.

On Wednesday, the number of Covid-19 vaccinations in Germany reached a new high: 656,357 doses were administered according to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) - 290,000 more than the previous day. This means that around 11.5 million citizens have now received at least one vaccination against Covid-19. 4.7 million people - and thus 5.7 percent of the population - are now fully vaccinated.

President Joe Biden announced Thursday that all US adults will be eligible to receive a Covid-19 vaccine by April 19, two weeks earlier than the initial May 1 date.

"Let me be deadly earnest with you: We aren’t at the finish line. We still have a lot of work to do. We’re still in a life and death race against this virus," Biden cautioned, adding that as "new variants of the virus are spreading and they’re moving quickly, cases are going back up, hospitalizations are no longer declining."

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said that 161,688,422 doses of Covid-19 vaccines have been administered in the United States as of Saturday, April 2.

104,213,478 people have received at least the first dose, and 59,858,146 people have been fully vaccinated.

Due to a manufacturing error, a batch of Johnson & Johnson's (J&J) Covid 19 vaccine is unusable. There was a problem with a drug substance for its vaccine that did not meet quality standards at Emergent Biosolutions' manufacturing facility, the US pharmaceutical company said on Wednesday.

The error had been reported to the FDA and more staff were now assigned to monitor production.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has released a statement, saying that "speeding up vaccination roll-out is crucial as new cases in the WHO European Region are increasing in every age group, apart from one."

Dr Hans Henri P. Kluge, WHO Regional Director for Europe, stated that vaccines are highly effective in preventing infections, but the "roll-out of these vaccines is unacceptably slow". Kluge is recommending "the same public health and social measures as we have in the past to compensate for delayed schedules" and added, "we must speed up the process by ramping up manufacturing, reducing barriers to administering vaccines, and using every single vial we have in stock, now."

“Only 5 weeks ago, the weekly number of new cases in Europe had dipped to under 1 million, but now the Region’s situation is more worrying than we have seen in several months. There are risks associated with the increased mobility and gatherings over the religious holidays. Many countries are introducing new measures that are necessary and everyone should follow as much as they can,” said Dr Dorit Nitzan, Regional Emergency Director for the WHO Regional Office for Europe.

German Health Minister Jens Spahn and the 16 state health ministers on Tuesday decided to suspend the routine use of the AstraZeneca vaccine for people under age 60 at an emergency meeting. The decision came amid fresh concern over unusual blood clots reported in a tiny number of younger people who received the vaccine.

Several European countries briefly suspended the use of the vaccine earlier this month, albeit in that instance for more elderly people rather than the young, but resumed jabs after EU regulators said the shot was safe for use.

New regulations announced Wednesday will make it easier to halt shipments of Covid-19 vaccines outside of the EU. The new rules were announced as a report emerged about 29 million AstraZeneca doses that were found during an inspection of a bottling plant in Italy.

The European Commission had negotiated vaccine supply contracts on behalf of the 27 EU member states, and Brussels has been frustrated by the slow pace of deliveries. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson took note of the new EU rules without mentioning vaccines but saying they could influence companies' decisions on where to invest.

Italian inspectors found a secret stock of 29 million doses of the AstraZeneca Coronavirus vaccine in a filling plant of the company near Rome. AstraZeneca delivered around 30 million doses to the EU so far, but promised three times as much. The EU Commission is now demanding accountability.

France will move on to Phase 2 of Coronavirus vaccination. Appointments will be authorized for all people over 70 from Saturday March 27th on, Emmanuel Macron announced on Tuesday. The country now has "an acceleration of the delivery of the number of doses and therefore we can move on to a second phase of more massive vaccination," Macron said.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) has released a statement, saying that the Data and Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB), an independent group of experts that advises US National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, was concerned "that AstraZeneca may have included outdated information from that trial, which may have provided an incomplete view of the efficacy data."

"Late Monday, the Data and Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) notified NIAID, BARDA, and AstraZeneca that it was concerned by information released by AstraZeneca on initial data from its COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial,” the statement says. “The DSMB expressed concern that AstraZeneca may have included outdated information from that trial, which may have provided an incomplete view of the efficacy data. We urge the company to work with the DSMB to review the efficacy data and ensure the most accurate, up-to-date efficacy data be made public as quickly as possible.”

Alain Fischer, France's vaccination chief, said Monday that he excepts a return to some kind of "normal" life by either Summer or Autumn. France has just resumed use of the AstraZeneca Coronavirus vaccine last week and Prime Minister Jean Castex received the first dose of the vaccine on Thursday.

The Russian sovereign wealth fund (RDIF) has concluded another agreement for the production of the Corona vaccine Sputnik V in India. The agreement with the company Stelis from the Indian pharmaceutical group Strides provides for the production of at least 200 million doses of the vaccine from the third quarter of 2021, as the sovereign wealth fund announced on Friday. In November, RDIF had already signed an agreement with Indian group Hetero for 100 million doses annually.

In contrast to dozens of other countries, the Russian vaccine has not yet been approved in India, where clinical trials are still underway. At the same time, Moscow is counting on broadening the production of the vaccine due to the high international demand in the pandemic.

The Brazilian government signed a contract with Pfizer for the purchase of 100 million doses of vaccine against Covid-19.

According to the schedule released by the Ministry of Health, the jabs are to be delivered between April and September.

German Health Minister Jens Spahn said on Friday he would be in favour of signing a national supply deal with Russia for its Sputnik V vaccine for Covid-19.

"I can also well imagine that we conclude contracts - and conclude them quickly," Spahn told a weekly news conference, adding that Germany was in close contact with Russia on questions to do with the vaccine. A prerequisite, however, is that there is more detail on how many doses could be delivered, he said.

The United States will reach the Biden administration's goal to administer 100 million Covid-19 vaccine doses on Friday, President Joe Biden said.

"I am proud to announce that tomorrow, 58 days into our administration, we will have met my goal of administering 100 million shots to our fellow Americans," so Biden. "That's weeks ahead of schedule. Even with the setbacks we faced during the winter storms."