(Washington) The American health authorities announced on Wednesday that they wanted to produce one billion more doses of messenger RNA vaccines each year, from 2022, “for the current pandemic” and in order to be able “to react quickly to any threats future pandemics ”.
“The objective […] is to expand the current capacity of a billion additional doses per year, with production starting by mid-2022, ”said Jeff Zients, the White House pandemic coordinator, during of a press conference.
To achieve this goal, the US Department of Health will solicit “companies that have produced messenger RNA vaccines to identify ways to increase their production capacity,” he said.
This plan, in addition to providing more doses for the American population, would “produce more COVID-19 vaccines for the world,” Zients said, according to whom the United States is expected to reach 250 million on Wednesday. doses distributed to 110 countries, ie “more than all the other countries combined”.
Washington also intends to prepare the American response to future pandemics in this way. “This program would also help us to produce doses between 6 to 9 months after the identification of a future pathogen”, assured Jeff Zients.
Joe Biden’s government, whose popularity has plummeted since the summer, wants to step up its effort to fight the pandemic. According to the American press, he should soon announce the purchase of 10 million antiviral treatments against COVID-19.
The United States, the country most bereaved by the pandemic in absolute terms with more than 760,000 deaths, continues to record more than 1,000 deaths per day on average over seven days according to the country’s main health agency, the CDC.