» Pharma companies plan joint pledge on vaccine safety,

Move aims to reassure public that firms won’t bow to political pressure.

A group of drug companies competing with one another to be among the first to develop coronavirus vaccines are planning to pledge early this week that they will not release any vaccines that do not follow rigorous efficacy and safety standards, according to representatives of three of the companies.

The statement, which has not yet been finalized, is meant to reassure the public that the companies will not seek a premature approval of vaccines under political pressure from the Trump administration. President Donald Trump has pushed for a vaccine to be available by October — just before the presidential election — and a growing number of scientists, regulators and public health experts have expressed concern over what they see as a pattern of political arm-twisting by the Trump administration in its efforts to combat the virus.

The companies’ joint statement was planned for early next week, but it may be released before then after its existence was made public Friday by The Wall Street Journal. The manufacturers that are said to have signed the letter include Pfizer, Moderna, Johnson & Johnson, GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi.

The pharmaceutical companies are not the only ones pushing back. Senior regulators at the Food and Drug Administration have been discussing making their own joint public statement about the need to rely on proven science, according to two senior administration officials, a move that would breach their usual reticence as civil servants.

Scientists have been rushing at record speed to develop a vaccine that could end the pandemic, which has taken nearly 190,000 lives and infected more than 6 million people in the United States. Three companies — Moderna, Pfizer and AstraZeneca — are testing their candidates in late-stage clinical trials.

Pfizer’s chief executive said last week the company could see results as early as October, but the others have said only that they plan to release a vaccine by the end of the year.

Public health experts have applauded the companies’ rapid development of a vaccine, and early results have been promising. But in recent weeks, they have grown worried as Trump and his allies have begun talking about a vaccine that could be ready before the election on Nov. 3.

Even as companies are competing to be the first to bring a coronavirus vaccine to market, they must navigate perilous political terrain. If they are among the first to bring a successful vaccine to market, they could earn major profits and help rehabilitate the image of an industry battered by rising drug prices.

But if a vaccine turns out to have dangerous side effects for some people, the fallout could be catastrophic, damaging their corporate reputations, putting their broader portfolio of products at risk and broadly undermining trust in vaccines, one of the great public health advances in human history.

In tweets and public comments, Trump has explicitly tied his reelection fortunes to a vaccine, an idea detailed at the Republican National Convention, where promotional videos featured the administration’s efforts to fund and develop one in its crash program called Operation Warp Speed.