Sanofi: ‘Unacceptable’ for US to get Covid-19 vaccine first, says France

Case highlights conflicts facing multinational companies and governments in the race to develop a vaccine

Sanofi's chief said this week that he would give the American market priority for a new Covid-19 vaccine. AFP

Giving the US priority access to a Sanofi vaccine against the new coronavirus would be “unacceptable,” a French government minister said.

“For us, it would be unacceptable that there be privileged access for this or that country on a pretext that would be a financial pretext,” Junior Economy Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher said in an interview Thursday on Sud Radio.

The US will likely be first in line should Sanofi succeed in developing a vaccine because the country was the first to fund the French company’s research, chief executive Paul Hudson said this week in an interview with Bloomberg News. The US, which expanded a vaccine partnership with the company in February, expects “that if we’ve helped you manufacture the doses at risk, we expect to get the doses first,” Mr Hudson said.

Mr Hudson’s comments highlighted the conflicts facing multinational companies and governments in the race to develop a vaccine against Covid-19. More than 140 world leaders and experts signed an open letter released by UNAIDS and Oxfam on Thursday, calling for a “people’s vaccine” as well as treatments that would be available swiftly to all for free.

“Nobody should be pushed to the back of the vaccine queue because of where they live or what they earn,” said South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa.

Health advocates have warned that the race could leave out countries that can’t afford protective doses, making them vulnerable to mass fatalities and economic wreckage, amid signs some countries will give their population priority.

Supplies of an experimental shot from the University of Oxford will be prioritised for the UK before other parts of the world, Pascal Soriot, chief executive of AstraZeneca Plc, which will manufacture the vaccine, said last month.

Asked on BFM Business TV if the US would be first in line for a Sanofi vaccine, Olivier Bogillot, the head of Sanofi France, said, “No, I don’t confirm it. It’s evident that if Sanofi discovers a medicine, a vaccine against Covid-19 and if it’s effective, it will be available to all.”

Sanofi has partnered with UK rival GlaxoSmithKline Plc on the project supported by the US and says it could make 600 million doses annually.

Production of Sanofi’s vaccine in the U.S. will mainly go to that market, while capacity elsewhere will cover Europe and the rest of the world, the company said in an emailed statement following Bloomberg’s report. The drugmaker is having “very constructive conversations” with the French and German governments and European Union institutions, it said.

France’s Pannier-Runacher said she immediately contacted Sanofi after Mr Hudson’s interview, and the local head of the company confirmed that the vaccine would be available to all countries, including France, especially because the company has production capacity there.