The Hague, January 8. / TASS /. The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has authorized the withdrawal of not five, but six doses from a single vial of Comirnaty, a vaccine co-developed by BioNTech in Germany and Pfizer in the United States. This is stated in the regulator's press release released on Friday.
The EM profile committee "recommended updating the instructions for use of the drug Comirnaty, specifying that each vial contains six doses of vaccine," the message says.
The agency stressed that special syringes and / or needles with a low dead volume must be used to extract the six doses. Using standard syringes and needles can make it impossible to remove the sixth dose of vaccine from the vial. The EM stressed that in the absence of a sufficient volume of vaccine, specialists should dispose of the vial and its residual contents, and not try to get the required dose from another vial.
On December 21, 2020, the European Medicines Agency recommended the issuance of an interim marketing authorization for the Comirnaty coronavirus vaccine. On the same day, the drug was approved by the European Commission (EC), which paved the way for the start of vaccination in the EU.
Initially, the EC planned to purchase 300 million doses of the vaccine, but on Friday it was announced that it would expand the contract to 600 million doses. Additional doses may begin at the end of the year.