AstraZeneca, a pharmaceutical company, aims to produce 2 billion coronavirus vaccines, including 400 million in the US and the UK, and 1 billion in low-income and small-sized countries. According to AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot, the vaccine is planned to be distributed in the United States and the United Kingdom in September and October. According to a press release, Governor Astra Geneca has signed a license agreement to provide 1 billion doses to low- and middle-income countries with serum labs in India, and a total of 400 million shots will be completed by the end of 2020. A vaccine called AZD1222 was formerly developed by the Oxford University (UK), and AstraZeneca is working with pharmaceutical industry partners to distribute and manufacture drugs.
Soriot said that this distribution is dependent on clinical trials going on until August. Manufacturing as well as clinical trials and are set to take place simultaneously, which is an unprecedented move in the pharmaceutical industry due to the risk of producing drugs that may not be effective. “We are very focused and very committed. When you have something like this with this sort of pandemic and the tremendous impact it has on people, the economy, et cetera, you can’t second-guess what’s going to happen. You can’t spend your time figuring out is it going to work or not going to work, you just have to commit. We come in and make a bet on some of these things,” Soriot said on the call.
About AstraZeneca:
AstraZeneca was founded in 1992 and is headquartered in Cambridge, UK. It is a global pharmaceutical company which focuses on the discovery, development, and commercialization of prescription medicines in the areas of oncology, cardiovascular, renal and metabolism, respiratory, infection, neuroscience, autoimmunity, and gastroenterology globally. The company’s products include medicines for oncology, cardiovascular, and metabolic diseases. Moreover, companies’ marketed products comprise medicines for respiratory diseases, neuroscience diseases and gastrointestinal diseases. It operates in over 100 countries and its medicines are used by millions of patients globally.
