Moderna And Pfizer On Track To Hit Vaccine Production Goals

 President Biden's promise that there'll be enough vaccines for each U.S. adult by the top of May has some Americans wondering if it's too good to be true.

Time will tell.

But before the pharmaceutical companies can hit their May goal, they'll get to reach an earlier target: Pfizer and Moderna agreed to provide 100 million doses a bit to the U.S. by the top of March. With slightly below three weeks left, both companies have their work cut out for them.

Nearly 64 million Moderna doses and 61 million Pfizer doses had been distributed as of Wednesday afternoon. the primary doses went out shortly after the Food and Drug Administration authorized the vaccines for emergency use in December.

So although around 80 percent of the time before the looming deadline has lapsed, the businesses have only distributed 63 percent of the doses they're obligated to.

"On Moderna and Pfizer, as you recognize, we've done tons to assist both companies with their manufacturing processes," President Biden's COVID-19 czar Jeffrey Zients said during a Feb. 24 press briefing. "We're in-tuned with all of them the time — daily, hourly — to form sure that we're doing anything we will to assist them and watch their production."

Help has included using the Defense Production Act, a wartime power both Biden and former President Donald Trump have wont to speed vaccine manufacturing. The Biden administration also helped Pfizer obtain equipment that it couldn't get during the Trump administration.

Will the businesses make the March goal? it's likely.

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Distributions skyrocketed the last fortnight, consistent with an NPR analysis of archived data from the CDC's vaccination tracker. Since early January, they wobbled between 8 million and 10 million total doses every week. But in both the last week of February and again the primary week of March, the businesses delivered around 20 million doses. If Pfizer and Moderna can keep it up, they'll both hit 100 million.

Both companies have expressed confidence. during a statement to NPR, Pfizer spokesman Steven Danehy also reiterated a promising CEO Albert Bourla made in late January to deliver even more doses by the top of the month.

"Since the top of last year, we've made several enhancements to our COVID-19 vaccine manufacturing facilities and processes – which has doubled our output.

As a result of these efforts and with the incorporation of the updated 6-dose label, we're on track to form 120 million doses available for shipment across the U.S. by the top of March and a further 80 million doses by the top of May. And, we anticipate all 300 million contracted doses are going to be made available for shipment within the U.S. by the top of July, enabling the vaccination of up to 150 million Americans."

Moderna spokesman Ray Jordan said, "We haven't been reporting weekly distribution numbers, but we do still expect to distribute 100 million doses by the top of the primary quarter (eg, March 31)."

Erin Fox, the senior director of drug information and support services at the University of Utah Health Hospitals, says she's hopeful that the drugmakers can deliver 100 million doses by the top of March. which albeit they do not, she hopes they hit the goal a couple of weeks later.

"So much of drug manufacturing and vaccine manufacturing is pretty opaque. We don't ... have tons of visibility there," says Fox, who also tracks drug shortages and provides issues nationally as a part of the American Society of Hospital Pharmacists. "But we do know that Pfizer is certainly ramping up to the purpose where they're taking other medicines offline. And we're actually expected to possess shortages of other products because they're ramping up that production."

But the constrained supply of vaccine doses thus far has made running vaccine clinics challenging, Fox says.

"We do not have an honest idea of what proportion we're getting to get real until it's in our hands," she said. "We can't calculate it. which means we will not organize our clinic with the folks that we'd like to be there to offer all the vaccines."

The Department of Health and Human Services didn't answer multiple requests to discussing this story.

Still, if accidentally the businesses don't deliver all those doses by March 31, it is vital to recollect that the target deliveries were supported projections, said Norman Baylor, a former director of the Food and Drug Administration's Office of Vaccines Research and Review.

"That's in a perfect situation," said Baylor, now president and CEO of Biologics Consulting. "But there might be fluctuations . . . So it doesn't suggest that there are catastrophic issues, but it does mean that something has — presumably within the manufacturing process, might be in testing — something has delayed that entire manufacturing process to miss the mark."

There's another wrinkle worth noting. Pfizer and Moderna only got to "release" the doses to the govt to satisfy their contractual obligations, meaning the doses do not have to go away from the factories to be counted toward the commitment. the businesses just need to say they're able to choose a distribution. therefore the companies can hit their contractual targets before the doses are delivered to vaccination sites.

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