MEPs on the special committee to oversee lessons learned from the Covid-19 pandemic wanted, on Monday 10 October, to question the heads of Pfizer and CureVac, in particular about the development of vaccines and past and potential contracts between their companies and the Commission.
Franz-Werner Haas represented CureVac. The majority of MEPs deplored the absence of Albert Bourla, CEO of Pfizer (see EUROPE 13039/13).
“Mr Bourla is not here, I’m sorry: I know that his presence could have helped answer some questions, but I am here and I am at your disposal”, said Janine Small, who was replacing him at the hearing.
According to Ms Small, the Court of Auditors’ report published in September is not the reason for Mr Bourla’s absence. “I can guarantee you that no”, she said, “I am in the best position to have this conversation with you”, she added, noting that she had worked at Pfizer for 35 years and had been involved in negotiating the contracts.
When MEPs were annoyed by the lack of response, Kathleen Van Brempt (S&D, Belgian), chair of the special committee, asked Ms Small to answer all their questions.
In response to a question about telephone exchanges between Mr Bourla and Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Ms Small said: “During the pandemic, we all teleworked, so I’m sure Mr Bourla provided his phone number so that he could talk to leaders around the world, including myself. I can do it myself too”, pointing out that the negotiations were not held by text message and involved large teams for both parties and established processes.
“You mentioned 1.8 billion doses traded by SMS. I can tell you categorically: this was not the case. There are very clear procedures in place at Pfizer and in the organisations” for such exchanges.
Ms Small did not wish to provide details on the prices of Covid-19 vaccines. “I think we will have to start a legislative process to get answers, but that is not our responsibility anymore”, Ms Van Brempt said.
Regarding the withdrawal of CureVac’s vaccine, Mr Haas said that intellectual property rights were not the reason for the withdrawal of the first vaccine that CureVac wanted to develop. For Mr Haas, the interim data on the vaccine simply did not meet the high standards. He added that a vaccine developed with GSK was in phase 1 and showed “OK results”. In addition, four other clinical trials for infectious disease vaccines are underway and Haas says he expects results by the end of the year.
Asked about the lessons of the crisis, the two leaders insisted on cooperation with the European institutions. They welcomed the regulatory efforts of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), including its continuous assessment process.
Both Ms Small and Mr Haas were keen to defend intellectual property rights as essential to research and innovation. Ms Small believes that weakening them “would penalise risky investments without helping patient access”.
Both leaders stressed the need for robust and open supply chains. Mr Haas also stressed that new industries require appropriate infrastructure and regulations. (Original version in French by Émilie Vanderhulst)