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From the NY Post on 11/9/20:
President-elect Joe Biden’s health care advisers met with drug companies before last week’s election about their efforts to produce coronavirus vaccines and treatments, a new report says.
Biden’s aides held the meetings in September and October with firms that are running late-stage clinical trials of vaccines and therapies for the deadly COVID-19 bug, according to Bloomberg News.
While Biden’s advisers broadly aimed to collect information about the development, production and distribution of the drugs, the talks also included discussion of Operation Warp Speed — the Trump administration’s multibillion-dollar vaccine initiative that the former vice president will take over when he enters the White House in January, the news service reported Sunday.
The reported talks offer some hints about the approach Biden will take to the vaccine race after his inauguration — which will come at a time when drugmakers could be preparing to widely distribute COVID-19 shots.
Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, announced Monday that their experimental shot was more than 90 percent effective in a late-stage clinical trial, putting it on track to seek emergency approval from the feds by the end of this month. Biotech firm Moderna has also said it expects to know by the end of November whether its vaccine works.
From the Pfizer CEO on 10/16/20:
As we get closer to an important data readout from our COVID-19 vaccine program, I wanted to speak directly to the billions of people, millions of businesses and hundreds of governments around the world that are investing their hopes in a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine to overcome this pandemic. I know there is a great deal of confusion regarding exactly what it will take to ensure its development and approval, and given the critical public health considerations and the importance of transparency, I would like to provide greater clarity around the development timelines for Pfizer’s and our partner BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine.
Further in:
So let me be clear, assuming positive data, Pfizer will apply for Emergency Authorization Use in the U.S. soon after the safety milestone is achieved in the third week of November. All the data contained in our U.S. application would be reviewed not only by the FDA’s own scientists but also by an external panel of independent experts at a publicly held meeting convened by the agency.
CNN on 9/14/20:
While heath experts stress that a Covid-19 vaccine might not be publicly available until 2021, there are promising signs among several of the vaccines currently in Phase 3 trials.
Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla told CBS' "Face the Nation" that there was a "quite good chance" researchers will know by the end of October whether its experimental vaccine works.
"Then, of course, it is (the) regulator's job to issue (a) license or not," Bourla said.
Amazing how Joe’s team met with Pfizer in September and October, but Pfizer decided to wait till after the election (not October) to release the good news (and the Pfizer CEO pushed back at Trump in early October as well)........
The CEO of Pfizer has donated plenty to Republican candidates this election season (showing that it’s not a partisan issue at hand), but then there‘s this from July of this year:
President Donald Trump's recent spate of executive orders targeting U.S. drug prices has received heaps of scorn from the pharmaceutical industry and its lobbyists. Now, Pfizer says Trump's mandates could threaten American jobs if they ever go into effect.
In an earnings call with investors Tuesday, CEO Albert Bourla blasted Trump's executive orders to rein in drug prices as "an enormous distraction" and threatened the possibility of job cuts for U.S. workers.
"We have plans to invest in both R&D and manufacturing in the United States," Bourla said. "If finalized, these new executive orders could force us to rethink those plans, consider job reductions and add to the economic and health anxiety already widely felt in our country."
Trump's newest efforts to stymie drug prices could also distract Pfizer's work at developing a COVID-19 vaccine alongside partner BioNTech, Bourla said. The vaccine entered phase 3 human testing Tuesday, and analysts have said Pfizer could rake in up to $15 billion in sales if the shot is found effective. The company agreed to sell 100 million doses to the U.S. government just last week for $1.95 billion.
"(Our workers) should worry only about how to defeat this virus and how to maintain the supply and should not start worrying about their jobs," Bourla said. "I think the timing was wrong."
Bourla's comments are the latest broadside between Big Pharma and the Trump administration after the president signed a series of executives orders that experts say likely won't have an effect on consumer pocketbooks anytime soon.
Apparently, messing with big pharma’s inflated prices is a no no. Orange Man Bad. Orange Man so Bad that Democrats will attempt to block the vaccine distribution until Biden is seated ......
Oh, and now the dems are yet again playing politics:
Not to mention Trump’s #1 social media troll admits that if the vaccine announcement was made prior to the election that it would have made a difference (what kind of doctor thinks like this?!?!?!?)
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