An inquiry is under way into Brazil’s Senate committee over whether the government of far-right President Zaich Bolsonaro mishandled his pandemic. coronavirus and failed to provide vaccines in a timely manner to curb the rapid rise in covid-19 cases, which have killed more than 430,000 Brazilians, the highest death toll from the disease since the United States.
According to the head of Pfizer for Latin America to Brazilian MPs, according to AMPE, the pharmaceutical industry has repeatedly offered to sell its vaccine against covid-19 to the Brazilian Ministry of Health from August to November 2020, but received no response from the government.
Pfizer executive Carlos Mourinho told lawmakers that the company’s president and CEO had sent a letter to Bolsonaro and his ministers, including then-Health Minister Eduardo Pazuelo, on September 12 expressing the company’s interest in offering vaccines to B .
According to the committee, no response from the government for two months.
Pazuelo, who was replaced in April amid growing criticism of delays in the immunization campaign, did not accept Pfizer’s proposals last year because believed that Brazil should rely on the British and Chinese vaccines anti-covid-19 produced in the country, two sources told Reuters.
Production problems and delays in China have slowed domestic production of these vaccines. Only 11% of adult Brazilians have been fully vaccinated.
Pazuelo is due to testify before the commission on May 19.
In his weekly live internet show yesterday Thursday Bolsonaru reassures Brazil better deal with Pfizer this year, while citing legal and health uncertainties for the delay in the deal as the vaccine had not received regulatory approval last year.
Finally the Brazil negotiated the purchase by Pfizer of 100 million installments in a contract he signed in March, with the first one million arriving in the country at the end of April. Another 628,000 doses of the Pfizer / BioNTech vaccine arrived in Brazil from Belgium on Wednesday, the health ministry said, adding that 1.6 million doses of the vaccine have been distributed so far.
Mourinho said Pfizer was set to sign a contract to buy an additional 100 million installments from Brazil, which would be delivered to the country in the fourth quarter of the year.
Suspension of AstraZeneca production
Meanwhile, Brazil’s Fiocruz Institute of Biomedicine announced yesterday that it would suspend production of the AstraZeneca vaccine against covid-19 for a few days next week due to a lack of ingredients.
New supplies of these ingredients are expected on May 22.
Fiocruz, a state-backed center based in Rio de Janeiro, said on Twitter that, based on existing stocks, it would be able to distribute vaccines by the first week of June, while the supply of additional ingredients would support production of vaccines after this period.
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