Brazil Ignores Pfizer's COVID-19 Vaccine; Ex-Health Minister Claims Country Does Not Need It

Between August and November last year, Pfizer offered to sell its COVID-19 vaccine to Brazil's Health Ministry several times but received no response, said Pfizer's Latin America chief executive Carlos Murillo. A Senate commission is looking at whether President Jair Bolsonaro's administration mishandled the pandemic by failing to procure vaccines in time to stop a surge that has killed over 430,000 Brazilians, the highest COVID-19 death toll outside of the United States.

Brazil signs deal with Pfizer in March

The local production of such vaccines has been delayed due to production issues and bottlenecks in China. Just 11 percent of Brazilian adults have been fully vaccinated. Bolsonaro said in his weekly live internet broadcast on Thursday that Brazil got a better deal this year than what Pfizer previously proposed, citing legal and health concerns because the vaccine had not yet received regulatory approval last year.

In March, Brazil signed a deal with Pfizer for 100 million doses, with the first 1 million doses coming in late April. On Wednesday, the Health Ministry said that another shipment of 628,000 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine arrived in Brazil from Belgium, bringing the total number of doses delivered in the national immunization program to 1.6 million. Per Global News, Pfizer is preparing to sign a deal for 100 million more doses to be sent to Brazil in the fourth quarter, said Murillo.

During his testimony, Murillo said that President Bolsonaro's son, Carlos Bolsonaro, a councilman in Rio de Janeiro, attended a December 14 meeting. Brazil, the epicenter of the outbreak in Latin America, has 15,359,397 confirmed cases.

Pfizer submitted six plans to the government on August 14, 18, and 26; November 11 and 24; and February 15, according to Brazilian online news source G1. Six vaccine plans from Brazil's Butantan Institute and three from the COVAX Facility, which distributes immunization shots to 190 nations, were also refused or overlooked by Bolsonaro's administration, Daily Mail reported.

Brazil ex-health minister saw no need for Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine

Last year, former Health Minister Eduardo Pazuello ignored Pfizer Inc's offer of COVID-19 vaccines because he believed Brazil could depend on British and Chinese vaccines produced in the region, according to two sources. Hundreds of thousands of people have died due to the infection, and Brazil desperately needs vaccines. The three-star Army general has been summoned by a legislative investigation into the mishandling of the world's deadliest coronavirus outbreak outside of the United States.

His testimony may be threatening to far-right President Jair Bolsonaro that the government is attempting to postpone his appearance before a Senate committee next Wednesday, where senators will question him about the vaccine shortage. According to two government sources familiar with the situation, Pazuello's office believed last year that by transferring technology from AstraZeneca PLC and China's Sinovac Biotech Ltd to public laboratories in the country, Brazil would be able to guarantee adequate COVID-19 vaccines.

According to sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity, when Pfizer first contacted the Health Ministry in August, Pazuello believed Brazil would not need a wide variety of vaccinations and did not even meet with Pfizer executives to negotiate their bid. "There was a positive expectation when the deal with AstraZeneca was signed that Brazil would be able to manufacture its own vaccines and that Pfizer would be unnecessary," one source said, as per Yahoo via Reuters.