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Mexico seeks new donation of vaccines against covid from the United States

2021-05-31T03:53:03.944Z


López Obrador and Kamala Harris discuss the possibility of sending a shipment with doses of Johnson & Johnson, approved this week by Mexican authorities


A healthcare worker fills a syringe with Johnson & Johnson's vaccine.Virginia Mayo / AP

A new vaccine has added to Mexico's options against the pandemic.

The Johnson & Johnson injection has been approved this week for emergency use by health authorities.

Although there is still no purchase contract, the intention of the Government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador is to pave the way for a possible donation of drugs against COVID from the United States, an issue that has been negotiated in recent days between both countries.

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“Some of the explorations that have been made regarding the support or collaboration that could come from the United States Government, which have been the subject of conversations between President López Obrador himself and Vice President Kamala Harris, could include the possibility that the support was with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, ”said the Undersecretary of Health, Hugo López-Gatell, in the latest daily report on the advance of the virus in the country. Harris will visit Mexico on June 8 with three main topics to discuss: the migration crisis, economic reactivation and the joint fight against the pandemic.

Last March, Mexico was the first country to receive vaccines from the United States, which leads the world rankings for vaccination after initially adopting a nationalist stance not to share its covid drugs. The White House lent its neighbor 2.7 million doses of AstraZeneca, with the understanding that Mexico would pay it with other doses, and from there announced that it would make its policy of support to other countries against the health emergency more flexible. In April, the president, Joe Biden, promised 60 million doses of Astra for the rest of the world and last week promised to send another 20 million more abroad before the end of June. Deliveries will be managed through the Covax mechanism.

Donations from the United States already include other vaccines, such as Moderna, Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson. Mexico's interest in the vaccine from Janssen, the Johnson & Johnson subsidiary that distributes it, is that it only requires a single dose, was 66% effective in clinical trials and makes immunization effective within two weeks of application, according to US authorities. López-Gatell has for the moment ruled out a direct negotiation with the US pharmaceutical company, despite the fact that it was one of the first to be formally offered to the authorities. CanSino was so far the only single-dose vaccine licensed for emergency use.

The Latin American country applies five different vaccines against the coronavirus --AstraZeneca, Pfizer, CanSino, Sinovac and Sputnik V - with the expectation of receiving some 250 million doses and the Government does not see the need to sign more contracts. Mexico received a shipment on Thursday with almost 2.3 million finished doses of AstraZeneca, the second shipment through the Covax mechanism and the largest that has been received since last December. "We have a good supply of the other five vaccines," said López-Gatell.

The goal is to have more flexibility in case there is a shortage of the other vaccines. In addition to Johnson & Johnson, the authorities have already given the green light to the Indian vaccine Covaxin, another alternative plan with which no purchase agreements have been concluded. The Secretary of Foreign Relations, Marcelo Ebrard, said this Friday that until this week around 40 million doses have already been received and the forecast is to close June with 65 million. The jump of 25 million in a single month is due, according to the authorities, to the fact that the local packaging of the AstraZeneca vaccine has been unlocked. The expectation is to finish 12.5 million doses in June, although part of the agreement that was signed with the Government of Alberto Fernández is that they be distributed in Argentina and 17 other countries in the region.

Use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was suspended between April 13 and 23 after six cases of thrombosis were detected among the more than six million who received it in the United States. Until the second week of May, the Center for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) detected 28 cases of thrombi or clots and three deaths that could be linked to this biological, with women between 30 and 39 years old as the highest risk group Although epidemiological authorities said there was no reason for other people who received it to be concerned. "An analysis of all the data available to date shows that the known and potential benefits of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine outweigh the known and potential risks,"the CDC noted after announcing the resumption.

Thousands of Mexicans have already applied the Johnson & Johnson dose, as part of vaccine tourism in the United States, especially in Texas, New York and California, with the advantage of not having to make the trip twice.

There is no official figure for how many residents have been vaccinated on the other side of the border, although López-Gatell said the estimate is around two million, according to various surveys.

Pending negotiations, the possibility of the vaccine being applied in Mexico is shaping up to be one of the main announcements after Harris's visit next month.

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Source: elparis

All news articles on 2021-05-31

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