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* EU to exercise option for up to 100 mln more Pfizer shots
* EU declined in July Pfizer offer for 500 mln doses -
document
* EU has ordered 200 mln doses so far, jab approval due next
week
By Francesco Guarascio
BRUSSELS, Dec 17 (Reuters) - The European Union will take up
its option to buy up to 100 million more doses of Pfizer and
BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine after turning down an opportunity in
July for a much bigger deal, according to EU officials and an
internal document.
The plan comes after some of the vaccine candidates ordered
by the EU faced unexpected delays in clinical trials, forcing
the bloc and other wealthy nations to rely for now on shots from
fewer manufacturers than initially planned.
The Pfizer/BioNTech shot, the first COVID-19 vaccine to be
approved by Western drugs regulators, is being rolled out in
countries including Britain and the United States, and is
expected to be approved for use in the EU next week.
The European Commission decided on Tuesday to exercise its
option to buy up to 100 million additional doses under an
existing contract with Pfizer and BioNTech, a
spokesman for the EU executive told Reuters on Thursday. Under
the same contract it has already ordered 200 million doses.
"We want to be sure to get more doses because there is big
demand," the spokesman said.
An EU official said talks were underway over how many of the
extra 100 million doses might be taken.
Pfizer did not respond to a request for comment. BioNTech
declined to comment.
Under the EU contract, the two firms have committed to
rapidly deliver 200 million doses after regulatory approval for
15.5 euros ($18.8) apiece, EU officials told Reuters in
November.
The extra 100 million doses would be supplied at the same
price, but with the timetable to be negotiated, EU officials
said.
Pfizer and BioNTech have said they can produce about 1.3
billion doses by the end of 2021, but they are trying to expand
manufacturing capacity as global demand surges.
DECLINED ORDER
The discussions to order more Pfizer shots, even before the
first shipments have arrived, underscore the pressure on the EU
to secure more supplies to tackle a pandemic that has already
killed 470,000 Europeans and is picking up pace in winter.
That contrasts with EU negotiators' more relaxed stance in
the summer, when the pandemic was waning and the bloc was
sealing supply deals with multiple vaccine makers.
At a meeting with EU diplomats in July, a Commission
official said the EU had declined an offer of 500 million doses
from Pfizer and BioNTech because it was too expensive, an
internal EU document seen by Reuters shows.
The Commission and BioNTech declined to comment on this.
Pfizer did not reply to a request for comment.
With a population of 450 million, the bloc is now relying
only on the 200 million Pfizer shots it has already ordered for
its first vaccinations, which could start around Christmas.
In January, the EU is also expected to approve the shot
developed by Moderna, but it has an initial order of
just 80 million doses, with an option for 80 million more. The
Commision this week has also decided to take up that option
immediately, the EU spokesman said.
Both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines require two doses per
person.
Pfizer's vaccines for the EU are produced at a plant in
Belgium, but the factory is currently also supplying the United
States, Britain and Canada.
"We have millions of doses ready (..) for distribution,
depending on regulatory approval," a spokesman for the plant
told Reuters, when asked whether shipments to countries outside
the EU could temporarily reduce supplies to the bloc.
In total, the EU has booked nearly 1.3 billion vaccines in
deals with Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson,
AstraZeneca/Oxford, Sanofi/GSK and CureVac, and has
options to buy another 660 million.
But clinical tests of the vaccines being developed by
AstraZeneca and Sanofi have suffered delays,
and CureVac has not yet begun large-scale trials.
Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca could submit applications
to EU regulators by March, the head of the EU drugs regulator
said last week.
($1 = 0.8207 euros)
(Reporting by Francesco Guarascio @fraguarascio; additional
reporting by Michael Erman and Ludwig Burger; editing by Mark
Potter)
