Switzerland adds $109 million to its Covid-19 vaccine procurement fund

Switzerland's government has allotted an additional $109 million to its COVID-19 vaccine procurement fund. As per a Swiss government press release, the federal authorities decided to increase the vaccine fund by 100 million francs in a meeting on November 11 with the objective to have sufficient room for maneuver for the purchase of additional vaccines. As per reports, so far, the Confederation has signed a deal with two manufacturers.

It further read, "It is currently not possible to say when a vaccine will be available. However, the Federal Office of Public Health estimates that the first vaccinations can be carried out in Switzerland during the first half of 2021." 

Switzerland plans for COVID-19 vaccine 

According to reports, the Swiss government has secured a total of almost 10 million doses with US pharmaceutical company Moderna and UK company AstraZeneca. In order to sign additional contracts, the Swiss government further said that it maintains contact with other manufacturers of "promising candidate vaccines". According to a tally by the John Hopkins University, Switzerland has a total of 243,472 cases with 3,112 fatalities. 

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AstraZeneca, meanwhile, announced that the FDA regulators had approved resumption for the Oxford coronavirus vaccine in the US, UK, Brazil, South Africa, and Japan confirming that it was safe. In September, AstraZeneca had voluntarily paused vaccination across all global trials for the monitoring committees to examine the vaccine’s safety data. 

AstraZeneca plans to publish its late-stage trial results later this year 2020 after readopts are submitted to the regulators. The trial results would be published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. 

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Also, in late October, Moderna said that the British health regulator has started the real-time review of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate. In a statement, the company said that Britain has begun the "rolling review process" of its experiment vaccine mRNA-1273. The announcement by the drugmaker is followed by the promising results of the preclinical viral challenge study of the potential vaccine as well as the positive interim analysis of the Phase 1 study of its RNA-based vaccine in the people aged between 18 to 55 and older adults that are 56+.

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