U.S. cancels multimillion-dollar deal with coronavirus vaccine maker whose plant ruined J & J doses

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Fri, 2021-11-05 10:38 — mike kraft

U.S. cancels multimillion-dollar deal with coronavirus vaccine maker whose plant ruined Johnson & Johnson doses Emergent BioSolutions said it will forgo about $180 million due to the contract’s termination. Andrew Jeong Washington Post

The federal government has canceled a deal worth $628 million with Emergent BioSolutions, the Maryland-based vaccine manufacturer that was a vanguard of the Trump administration’s program to rapidly produce vaccines to counter the coronavirus pandemic.

The company disclosed the development on Thursday in a conference call discussing its latest financial results. The cancellation comes after Emergent’s manufacturing facilities in Baltimore were found to have produced millions of contaminated vaccine doses this spring, prompting a months-long shutdown.

Emergent will forgo about $180 million due to the contract’s termination, the company said. As part of its coronavirus efforts, the federal government had invested in building additional capacity at two of the firm’s sites.

After winning the lucrative contract from the Trump administration, whose initiative to accelerate vaccine development and distribution was known as Operation Warp Speed, Emergent ran into production problems.

In March, ingredients intended for use in producing the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine shots contaminated 15 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. In response, the Biden administration put Johnson & Johnson in direct control of vaccine production there and removed AstraZeneca manufacturing from the facilities. ...

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