
The European Commission approved the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine on Thursday, the fourth licensed vaccine to be authorized in the European Union.
The approval follows the European Medicines Agency (EMA) – the EU’s medicines regulator – authorization for the single dose vaccine “after a thorough evaluation” of Johnson & Johnson’s data found it met the criteria for efficacy, safety and quality.
"The Janssen vaccine is the fourth authorized vaccine of the EU's portfolio and will help us enhance the vaccination campaign in the second quarter of 2021,” the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said, referring to the vaccine by the name of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccines division.
“It only requires a single dose, which takes us another step closer to achieving our collective goal of vaccinating 70% of the adult population by the end of summer," von der Leyen said in a statement.
Its approval offers a boost for the EU’s vaccination rollout that has been criticized as going at a slow pace, hit by supply problems and delays.
The statement added the Commission has approved the contract with the conditional market authorization that J&J deliver 200 million of their single dose Covid-19 vaccines to the EU starting in the second quarter of 2021.