US, allies tussle over vaccines lying unused

Millions of coronavirus vaccine doses are in cold storage in the US that can’t be injected in the states because they are not yet approved by the Food and Drug Administration

- Zeke Miller, Raf Casert and Samuel Petrequin

Millions of coronavirus vaccine doses are in cold storage in the US that can’t be injected in the states because they are not yet approved by the Food and

Drug Administration, but the Biden administration is not allowing them to be sent overseas, where American allies are struggling to get enough doses for vulnerable populations.

The two-dose vaccine from AstraZeneca has received emergency approval from the European Union and World Health Organisation, but not in the US. Now US partners are prodding President Joe Biden to release the supply, noting that the administration has lined up enough doses of the three already-approved vaccines to cover every American adult by the end of May and the entire US population by the end of July.

AstraZeneca said that the US-produced vaccines are “owned” by the US government and that sending them overseas would require White House approval.

“We understand other governments may have reached out to the US government about the donation of AstraZeneca doses, and we’ve asked the US government to give thoughtful consideration to these requests,” Gonzalo Viña, a spokesman for AstraZeneca, said in a statement.

EU member states’ ambassadors this week discussed the challenge of accessing US-produced doses of the AstraZeneca shots. The German government said on Friday it was in contact with US officials about vaccine supplies, but stressed that the European Commission had the lead when it comes to procuring shots for member states.

Biden and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen have directed representatives to discuss supply chains in vaccine production.