Merck will help make J&J vaccine
WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden announced Tuesday that Merck will help Johnson & Johnson make its COVID-19 vaccine to speed up supply.
A White House official confirmed the announcement, which was first reported by The Washington Post.
Also on Tuesday, vaccination centers were to start receiving some of the 3.9 million doses of J&J vaccines, which received emergency use authorization on Saturday. That’s the entirety of its current inventory.
States have been told by the administration that distribution and delivery will be uneven in early March.
The bulk of the company’s total 20 million doses expected to be delivered by the end of the month will be concentrated in the latter half of March.
J&J is expected to produce 100 million doses by the end of June.
The deal between Merck and J&J, which was brokered by the Biden administration, could sharply boost supply, according to The Washington Post.
At the daily briefing ahead of Biden’s announcement, White House press secretary Jen Psaki called the venture an “historic manufacturing partnership.”
“As soon as we learned that Johnson & Johnson was behind in manufacturing ... we took steps to make sure we could expedite that with one of the world’s biggest manufacturers,” Psaki said.
The administration invoked the wartime authority of the Defense Production Act to make sure Merck has the vaccine components and equipment needed to make the vaccine, Psaki said. The Defense Department is also providing logistical support.
“We have used the full power of the federal government to expedite the manufacturing,” Psaki said.
Merck is not producing its own vaccine.
The two others are made by Moderna and Pfizer-biontech.
Most communities will have all three types of the coronavirus vaccine, but not at every vaccination site, administration officials have said.
J&J’S vaccine has the advantage of needing only one dose compared to the two doses for Moderna’s and Pfizer-biontech’s. It also doesn’t need to be kept in a freezer, making it easier to transport and store.
But the Moderna and Pfizer-biontech vaccines appear to be more effective than J&J’S, showing better than 94% effectiveness in large trials they ran last year.
The vaccines can’t be compared directly, however, because the trials were conducted at different times. J&J’S vaccine appeared to be 72% effective among U.S. trial participants. It was less effective in South Africa and Latin America, where newer strains of the virus are circulating.
It was nearly 100% effective at preventing hospitalizations and deaths.
“This means we now have three safe and highly effective vaccines that prevent serious illness, hospitalization, and death from COVID-19,” Rochelle P. Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Monday.
But because of the difference in effectiveness in contracting the virus, administration officials said they are directing jurisdictions to distribute them equitably – and will be watching to make sure that happens.
“Should certain vaccines go consistently to certain communities, we will be able to intervene,” Dr. Marcella Nunez-smith, head of the administration’s COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force, told reporters on Monday. “We’re here to provide support and technical assistance to pivot and intervene and correct, if and when needed.”