France will receive around eight million doses of the Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine in total by the end of June, the health ministry said, with around 500,000 doses in April.
The American laboratory, whose vaccine is the fourth to be approved in the European Union, must start its deliveries in Europe on April 19, before ramping up.
Read also: Covid-19: where are we with deliveries and stocks of vaccines?
By comparison, some 47 million doses of the other three authorized vaccines will be delivered to France in April, May and June, two-thirds of which will be supplied by Pfizer-BioNTech, according to a table from the Ministry of Health.
Johnson & Johnson's vaccine is the first, among those given a WHO green light, to require only one injection instead of two.
It can be stored at refrigerator temperatures, like that of AstraZeneca and unlike those of Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna.
During a press point organized by the Association of Economic and Financial Journalists (AJEF) on Wednesday, the Minister of Industry, Agnès Pannier-Runacher also mentioned the case of the Spoutnik V vaccine. Currently evaluated by the Agency European medicine, it arouses division among the 27. Germany has notably stated that it is ready to use it, provided that it is approved by the EMA.
Debate around Sputnik V
For its part, Austria announced Tuesday discussions with Russia to receive one million doses, while France has accused Moscow and Beijing of using their vaccines as propaganda tools.
"In
order to be able to deliver the millions of doses promised, we must already set up production chains
", underlined Ms. Pannier-Runacher, referring in particular to the four to five months necessary to carry out the "
fill and finish
"
stages.
that is to say, bottling and packaging.
Sputnik V is based on viral vector technology, such as that of Johnson & Johnson.
But he uses two adenoviruses as a support, against one for the American vaccine.
"
This doubles the trouble in terms of production, because you need two parallel production lines for each adenovirus
", commented the Minister.
Read also: Pharmacies want to increase vaccinations
The latter also returned to the case of the French laboratory Sanofi, behind on its own projects, and which has signed agreements with its competitors to produce part of their vaccines.
"
We are therefore on a capacity for Sanofi to serve 27 million doses per month (...) in the 3rd quarter, rather September at full speed, not counting their own vaccine,
" she said.
Finally, the minister estimated separately on BFMTV that “
less than 1%
” of the doses currently available are “
lost
” in France, “
a very low rate in reality
”.
