Argentina Grants Emergency Approval to Pfizer/BioNTech Vaccine

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Argentina’s medicine and food regulator granted on Tuesday, December 22nd, an emergency use for the Pfizer/BioNtech vaccine in the country. These vaccines are expected to arrive in Argentina sometime between January and March.

“The product presents an acceptable benefit-risk equilibrium, which enables awarding the registration and conditional authorization for the indicated purpose” was the statement from the Medicines, Food and Medical Technological National Administration, ANMAT, a rare organizations in the Argentine bureaucracy which enjoys international recognition for its rigorous scientific expertise.

Based on this authorization and the fact that some 6,000 Argentines volunteered to test the Pfizer vaccine, the Argentine government announced that a million and a half of the Pfizer vaccines will be reaching the country in the first half of next year.

In effect Anmat said that the authorization was extended for a year under the condition of “emergency registry”, similar to those extended in Europe and in the US. The contract will be signed by Argentina’s public health minister and will provide some 1,5 million vaccines between January and March 2021. Apparently the cost of each vaccine dose is estimated at 20 Euros, according to Argentine sources.

The announcement was made public when a special Aerolineas Argentinas flight departed from Argentina to Moscow in order to pick up the first batch of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine against the coronavirus.

”Today at 19:30 (01:30) on Wednesday Moscow time, a special flight will depart from Ezeiza [airport] for Moscow to bring to Argentina the first Sputnik V vaccines against COVID-19,” wrote the Argentine airline president Pablo Ceriani.

The mission involving an Airbus A330 plane, will take 40 hours with 20 participants involved. The vaccine will be packaged in thermo boxes with a temperature of minus 18 Centigrade maintained.

Earlier, the official Twitter account of the Russian vaccine reported that the Russian Direct Investment Fund and the government of Argentina had signed a contract to deliver 10 million of the first doses of the Sputnik V vaccine. Argentine President Alberto Fernandez stated that he will be the first in his country to get inoculated with the Russian vaccine.