Story at a glance
- The company pushed officials to consider releasing it from its obligation to provide 300 million shots to the U.S. so it can provide vaccines to the European Union.
- On Friday, White House officials made it clear that the vaccines, for now, will not be going abroad as the priority is to make vaccines available to all Americans as soon as possible.
- “At this time, there have been requests around the world, of course, from a number of countries who have requested doses from the United States, and we have not provided doses from the U.S. government to anyone,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said.
The Biden administration says it will hold on to its stockpile of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine as the pharmaceutical company has appealed to the U.S. to share doses with European countries that have already given it approval.
AstraZeneca has yet to apply for emergency use authorization with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as it is still carrying out phase three trials, but millions of doses have been manufactured in the U.S. and are being held in facilities in Ohio and Maryland ahead of approval.
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Reports this week said the company pushed officials to consider releasing it from its obligation to provide 300 million shots to the U.S. so it can provide vaccines to the European Union, where countries that have authorized the AstraZeneca vaccine are facing shortages.
On Friday, White House officials made it clear that the vaccines, for now, will not be going abroad as the priority is to make vaccines available to all Americans as soon as possible.
“The president’s priority and focus is on ensuring that the American people are vaccinated,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said during a news briefing Friday.
“At this time, there have been requests around the world, of course, from a number of countries who have requested doses from the United States, and we have not provided doses from the U.S. government to anyone,” she said.
Psaki said the administration wants to ensure the U.S. is “oversupplied and overprepared” and the ability to provide the most effective vaccine to the American public.
“There are still 1,400 who are dying in our country every single day,” Psaki said. “So this is not about Europe. This is about our focus and our priority.”
White House COVID-19 response coordinator Jeff Zients said the U.S. is providing support globally through other channels, including its commitment of up to $4 billion to COVAX, the international program to secure vaccines for low-income countries.
“We’re following the exact same process that we did with the three other, now-approved, vaccines,” Zients said Friday.
“We have a small inventory of AstraZeneca so that if approved we can get that inventory out to the American people as quickly as possible,” he said.
President Biden on Thursday said the U.S. has secured enough vaccine doses to have adequate supply for every adult by the end of May, although he cautioned not every American will be vaccinated by then.
He directed states to make all adults eligible for shots no later than May 1.
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