What’s happening?
A congressional report released Tuesday revealed that Emergent BioSolutions discarded 400 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccine—more than what was previously reported—due to possible contamination, Meredith Cohn writes for the Baltimore Sun. The report, which details a year-long investigation by the House of Representatives’ Covid-19 panel, also disclosed the Maryland vaccine manufacturer attempted to conceal faults in its quality control system.
What prompted the panel’s report?
The report–titled “The Coronavirus Vaccine Manufacturing Failures of Emergent BioSolutions” follows the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis’s previously published findings about Emergent’s Bayview facility in May. Federal inspectors alerted officials of potential quality control issues at Emergent, but the Trump Administration contracted with the company to produce vaccines anyway. The Biden Administration canceled the contract in November 2021.
In response to the latest report, company spokesperson Matt Hartwig said in a statement, “Emergent and our government partners were attempting to compress into a few months the development and scale up of drug substance manufacturing processes that normally take years.” He added, “We were always transparent with our public and private partners about our process and capabilities.”
Anything else I should know?
The company is now under fire from shareholders and regulatory agencies, including a lawsuit from shareholders claiming insider trading and artificial inflation of the stock prices.
You can read more here.
