Pfizer’s medical director of developed Asia,Dr Krishan Thiru,said at this stage Pfizer understood the European Union change was a notification rather than an export control.
“It’s absolutely critical governments don’t impose export restrictions or trade barriers that risk the welfare of patients,” he said.
“Should that happen,we will examine what options are available.”
Australian Medical Association president Dr Omar Khorshid told the committee while the news from Europe was a concern,it had to be put into perspective.
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“We have demonstrated through this pandemic through border controls and other public health measures that we can keep this virus at bay,and we’re going to need to continue to do that during the vaccine rollout,” he said.
“Whether there’s a few weeks’ delay in the vaccine,I don’t think that’s going to have a material impact on the health of Australians because we will keep those other measures in place.”
Health Department deputy secretary Caroline Edwards said they had planned for a “range of scenarios” depending on vaccine availability.
“In the worst-case scenario we would commence when we start the onshore production of AstraZeneca.”
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CSL,the company contracted to produce the AstraZeneca vaccine in Melbourne,did not appear at the hearing after declining repeated invitations,committee chairwoman Senator Katy Gallagher said.
In emails published by the committee,CSL said it was in a “critical period” of vaccine production as it aims to have doses ready by mid-March,and could not spare someone for a Senate hearing until April.
Despite concerns around immediate supply,in the future,Australia could potentially get more doses of the Pfizer vaccine,the company’s market access director Louise Graham said,thanks to its expanded manufacturing capability.
“The allocation to Australia is 10 million doses. As Pfizer is now scaling up and looking to produce far more than was originally expected,we expect to be in future discussions about the ability to increase that[allocation],” she said.
Ms Graham said those discussions had not yet begun,but the company anticipates it will begin talks with the government about increasing the number of vaccine units once the first doses start arriving in Australia.
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