President Donald Trump is accusing Pfizer of deliberately withholding its COVID-19 vaccine’s trial results until after the election.
“Pfizer and others even decided to not assess the results of their vaccine, in other words, not come out with a vaccine until just after the election. That’s because of what I did with favored nations and these other elements,” Trump said.
He added, “Instead of their original plan to assess the data in October, so they were going to come out in October, but they decided to delay it because of what I’m doing which is fine with me because frankly, this is just a very big thing.”
Watch his comments below:
Trump accuses Pfizer of waiting “until just after the election” to assess safety of vaccines because of Trump’s efforts to lower drug prices.
— The Recount (@therecount) November 20, 2020
Pfizer has repeatedly said its timeline is based on science. pic.twitter.com/MZaUJtFj9o
Albert Bourla, CEO of Pfizer, told Axios data from the trial did not come in until the Thursday or Friday following Election Day.
“From the time that the data comes in, before the committee meets, some people need to prepare for each case a very big and accurate narrative. And the physician should sign it. So there’s a lot of work that needs to be done. But we did it with the speed of light,” Bourla said.
Axios’s Dan Primack asked Bourla if he would have released the results prior to Election Day if was able to.
“If it was before, I would have released it before. If it is now, I’ll release them now,” Bourla said.
Pfizer announced Friday it had applied for emergency use of the vaccine, as IJR previously reported.
Less than a week ago, final trial results from Pfizer and BioNTech SE showed the vaccine was 95% effective.
Bourla told PBS Thursday when the average American would have access to the vaccine, as IJR previously reported.
“I believe sometime in the next year, maybe the third or the second quarter. The reason why I’m saying that, we will be able to provide to the American people around 20 million or more doses this year,” Bourla said.