PoliticoCoronavirus: FDA advisory panel recommends use of Pfizer vaccine
- Decision paves the way for the agency to authorise emergency use of the Covid-19 shot
- The vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech is the first one to undergo FDA review
This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Sarah Owermohle and Zachary Brennan on politico.com on December 10, 2020.
An independent FDA advisory committee said that the benefits of Pfizer‘s coronavirus vaccine outweigh the risks, setting the stage for the agency to authorise emergency use of the shot for people 16 and older.
The panel – comprising academic scientists, doctors and officials from other federal health agencies – voted 17 to 4 in favour of the vaccine, with one member abstaining.
Developed by Pfizer’s German partner, BioNTech, the Covid-19 vaccine is the first to undergo FDA review. The vaccine proved 95 per cent effective at preventing disease in a 44,000-person US trial whose peer-reviewed results were published on Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Members of the FDA advisory committee supported authorising the vaccine but had questions about possible allergic reactions reported in Britain. Several of the experts also pushed unsuccessfully for the panel to endorse a narrower authorisation that would leave out some teens and population groups at lower risk from the virus.