“Delayed delivery of vaccines, the purpose of confirming correctness due to production problems”
AFP news agency reported on the 28th (local time) that the European Union (EU) executive commission has requested the Belgian authorities to inspect one of the country’s multinational pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca’s vaccine production plant for the novel coronavirus infection (Corona 19). .
“The EU Commission has requested a production flow check,” a spokesman for the Belgian Federal Agency for Medicines and Health Products said.
Earlier, the Associated Press and others said that the Belgian health authorities had checked the company’s factory in their country to see if the delay in delivery of AstraZeneca’s Corona 19 vaccine was due to a production problem at the request of the EU Commission.
However, a spokesman for the Belgian Federal Agency for Medicines and Health Products explained that the factory was inspected earlier this month, but it was a regular inspection that was not related to the EU Commission.
In this regard, an EU spokesman refused to confirm, AFP news agency said.
The EU and AstraZeneca have recently been struggling with the problem of supplying a vaccine for Corona 19.
When AstraZeneca announced on the 22nd that the initial supply to Europe would be reduced due to a disruption in the production of the COVID-19 vaccine, the EU is pressing the company by demanding that the UK-produced vaccine be returned to the EU.
AstraZeneca announced that it plans to reduce its initial EU supply from 80 million to 31 million.
The Belgian-based pharmaceutical technology company Novasef’s plant is one of AstraZeneca’s European production facilities for the COVID-19 vaccine.
The EU approved the use of the COVID-19 vaccine jointly developed by US pharmaceutical company Pfizer with German Bioentech and began vaccination at the end of last month.
However, as the initial supply of vaccines did not meet the initial expectations, concern among member countries is growing. In the case of Spain, the capital Madrid announced on the 27th that vaccinations would be suspended for two weeks due to lack of vaccines.
The Corona 19 vaccine jointly developed by AstraZeneca with Oxford University in the UK is currently being reviewed for conditional marketing approval by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), and the results are expected on the 29th.
The EU has previously signed a vaccine supply contract with Pfizer-Bioentech and AstraZeneca, as well as US pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson, French pharmaceutical company Sanofi, UK GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), US Modena, and German CureVac. .
/yunhap news
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