EU rebukes UK’s Pfizer coronavirus vaccine approval as FDA stands firm on timeline - Fox News

FDA is scheduled to meet regarding the companies’ application for emergency use authorization (EUA) and nearly a month before the European Union plans to issue its own decision.

The EU’s regulatory agency must approve a vaccine for use, but the U.K.’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) used an emergency procedure to skirt the process and make it available for its own citizens.

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) said it plans to make a decision regarding the coronavirus vaccine for the EU by Dec.

6, according to Reuters, which was meant to speed the process up, but was still not as quick as the U.K.’s own review.

“I consider this decision to be problematic and recommend that EU Member States do not repeat the process in the same way,” Peter Liese, an EU lawmaker from German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party, said, according to Reuters.

“Let me be clear – our scientists have to make the decision and they will take the time that’s needed to make the right call on this important decision,” he said in a statement provided to Fox News.

“We want to move quickly because this is a national emergency, but we will make sure that our scientists take the time they need to make an appropriate decision.

It is our job to get this right and make the correct decision regarding vaccine safety and efficacy.”.

“What we need to do, in a very clear, understandable way, is explain and I try to do this as often as I possibly can – that the speed [of vaccine development] itself is a reflection of scientific advances,” Fauci said during a recent virtual discussion with the Hastings Center