The president promised that the United States will share its stocks of vaccines with other countries only after all interested Americans are vaccinated.
President Joe Biden on Wednesday promised that US residents would get the COVID-19 vaccine first. Biden said this during a meeting with the heads of pharmaceutical companies Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and Merck, who agreed to produce a single-dose vaccine developed by J&J.
According to the White House, the president met with J&J CEO Alex Gorsky and Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier to discuss their “historic partnership for additional production of COVID-19 vaccines.”
As reported by Reuters, Joe Biden said that he ordered an increase in the purchase of the vaccine made by J&J because the United States “needs maximum flexibility” in the event of unforeseen problems. Simultaneously, the president stressed that the United States will share vaccines with the rest of the world, but only in case of an oversupply of supplies. The priority in getting the vaccine is for the Americans, the head of the White House stressed.
“We will start by taking care of the Americans first; then we will try to help the rest of the world,” the president said, speaking to reporters after meeting with Johnson & Johnson and Merck executives.
“If we have a surplus, we will share it with the rest of the world,” Biden repeated, recalling that the United States has already committed $ 4 billion to the global COVAX initiative to distribute vaccines in developing countries.
