British pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca confirmed this Wednesday (08/05) that it will stop selling its vaccine against Covid-19 Vaxzevria, one of the first to be marketed during the pandemic. The main reason cited is the drop in demand for the vaccine.
The British group also reported a “surplus of vaccines” to deal with different variants of the virus and a “decline in demand for Vaxzevria, which is no longer manufactured or distributed”.
“AstraZeneca has therefore taken the decision to withdraw marketing authorization for Vaxzevria in Europe,” the statement said. And he also announced that he wanted to “conclude this chapter”.
The day before, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) also announced on its website that Vaxzevria’s marketing authorization had been withdrawn at the request of the pharmaceutical company.
The group will also “work with other regulatory bodies around the world to begin withdrawing marketing authorizations for Vaxzevria where there is no expectation of future demand for the vaccine.”
A source close to the company’s management told journalists from the AFP news agency that “there have been no sales for some time”.
“We are incredibly proud of the role that Vaxzevria played in ending the pandemic,” added the group in its statement, stating that “according to independent estimates, more than 6.5 million lives were saved in the first year alone” of using the vaccine. , “and more than three billion doses have been distributed around the world”.
Vaxzevria, one of the first on the market, suffered a series of setbacks, including lack of marketing authorizations in some countries
Disadvantages and risks of thrombosis
While AstraZeneca’s first-quarter profit rose 21% year-on-year, driven mainly by sales in the oncology segment, the group has been reporting a steady decline in sales of Ccvid-related drugs for months – as has its rival GSK, which has fallen well behind in the race to develop a vaccine.
Vaxzevria, one of the first on the market, suffered a series of setbacks, including the lack of marketing authorizations in some countries, such as the United States. The vaccine has also had delivery problems in Europe, combined with suspected increased risks of thrombosis following several deaths.
Astrazeneca says that in April 2021, with the agreement of the British regulatory body MHRA, it updated information about Vaxzevria to include the possibility that, in rare cases, it could trigger thrombosis.
The United Kingdom, which initially relied on Vaxzevria at the beginning of its anti-covid vaccination campaign, later replaced it with competing vaccines. The AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines were soon largely abandoned in favor of those from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, both messenger RNA vaccines, in European countries.
However, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson maintained a central role in Covax, an international Covid vaccination aid scheme for less wealthy countries.
AstraZeneca points out that regulators and several states that authorized the vaccine considered that “the benefits of vaccination far outweigh the risks of extremely rare side effects.”
Already abolished in Australia since last year
The thrombosis syndromes in question, thrombocytopenia (TTS), lead to the formation of a blood clot with potentially fatal consequences. This rare syndrome occurred in around 2 to 3 of every 100,000 people vaccinated with the AstraZeneca serum. TTS appears to be more severe in young women. Almost all reported cases occurred after the first dose of the vaccine.
The group is facing several lawsuits over the fallout from the vaccine, including one in the UK on behalf of 51 people.
Tags: falling orders AstraZeneca withdraws Covid19 vaccine European market
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