The World Health Organization expects to make decisions on whether to give emergency use approval to COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca in the coming weeks, its chief scientist said on Friday, APA reports citing Reuters.
Soumya Swaminathan said the global health body could decide on Pfizer’s vaccine candidate in the next “couple of weeks”, and later said it could also review Moderna’s and AstraZeneca’s candidates in a few weeks.
WHO approval could allow a vaccine to be deployed in some countries where national medical regulators have not yet been able to evaluate it. Swaminathan said at least 10 companies had expressed an interest in or submitted a request for emergency approval for vaccine candidates.
Pfizer’s vaccine has already received emergency approval in Britain and Canada, and could receive U.S. approval within days. The first British recipients were vaccinated this week.
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