EU says deal to use Aspen plant in SA to bottle vaccines is temporary

The European Commission said on Thursday it has struck a temporary deal to use the Aspen plant in SA to bottle Johnson & Johnson (J&J) Covid-19 vaccines that are being imported into the EU.

The deal highlights the complexity of producing vaccines with factories spread across the world and is likely to stir concerns about drugmakers’ power in negotiating supply deals with countries.

On Wednesday, World Health Organization (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters he was “stunned” by news that J&J vaccines are being exported from SA to the EU, because the EU already has very high vaccination rates while in many African countries not even the most vulnerable have been vaccinated.

An European Commission spokesperson told reporters on Thursday the agreement with SA was reached after J&J faced problems in producing vaccines in the US at a factory belonging to its partner, Emergent Biosolutions.

Under the deal, SA drugmaker Aspen Pharmacare bottles the vaccine substance produced elsewhere and then transfers the finished doses to SA and the EU.

A J&J factory in Leiden in the Netherlands is a major producer of its vaccine substance for Covid-19 shots worldwide. From September, J&J will transfer all bottling operations for vaccines directed to the EU to Leiden, the EU spokesperson said.

J&J was not immediately available for comment.

The news of SA’s exports of vaccines to the EU was reported by the New York Times on Monday, confirming earlier public statements from President Cyril Ramaphosa and from Aspen Pharmacare. The paper cited a confidential contract between J&J and SA’s government and said the deal prevented the country, against its will, from imposing restrictions on vaccine exports.

Under its contract with the EU, J&J also negotiated a complex supply chain that involves US-based firms despite opposition from EU countries, EU internal documents seen by Reuters show.

On Thursday, the WHO softened its remarks on the EU-SA deal. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO regional director for Africa, told a news conference the arrangement “presumably” is part of investment in the development and production of vaccines in Africa. The EU is leading global investments to create vaccine “hubs” in Africa, including SA and Senegal, to increase the continent’s ability to manufacture Covid-19 vaccines.

The Aspen plant does not appear among the manufacturing sites approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) for J&J vaccines, meaning the shots cannot be used in the EU, though they may be re-exported.

The commission did not respond to questions on what EU countries will do with J&J doses imported from SA. EU nations are the owners of vaccines and decide how to use them.

Public EU data shows that J&J has delivered 21.5-million doses to the EU by Thursday. It was supposed to have shipped 55-million already by the end of June.

Of the delivered doses, only 12.9-million, or about 60%, have been administered in the EU, public data shows, by far the lowest take-up among all EU-approved vaccines, which have a usage rate of at least 75%, and above 90% for the Pfizer/BioNTech shot.

Many EU countries have stopped using J&J over health concerns. The EU has promised to donate at least 200-million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to poorer nations, mostly in Africa, by the end of the year.

Reuters