The commercial scale vaccine for Covid-19 is already being made and the supply chain is not a concern, according to US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.
“This is what’s really unprecedented with President Trump’s Operation Warp Speed. We are literally making the commercial scale vaccine now, as we’re going through the clinical trials,” Azar said Wednesday on CNBC. “We’re doing that at-risk using the full power of the US government and our financial resources to do that. No one’s ever done this before.”
Azar said he is not concerned with the supply chain when it comes to manufacturing vaccines for Covid-19.
“We’re not concerned about the supply chain and it’s domestic manufacturing across the portfolio that we’re investing in,” he said.
Azar also said that they have sufficient supplies for the vaccines once they are approved.
“We – right at the beginning of Operation Warp Speed – worked to lock down fill-finish capacity, as well as syringes, needles and glassware, so we’ve secured that to be able to ensure that we’ll be able to vaccinate the American people once we get vaccines that are demonstrated safe and effective to the FDA’s gold standard of approval or authorization,” he said.
The partnership with the US Department of Defense is critical, Azar said, because “they bring just incredible logistics and procurement capabilities to the table for this historic effort.”