Infectious diseases expert Dr Gérard Schockmel told RTL about the advantages of the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University.
The AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine can be stored in a normal fridge, will be cheaper than the mRNA vaccines approved so far, and around 3 billion doses are expected to be produced this year.
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This was confirmed by infectious diseases expert Dr. Gérard Schockmel from Hôpitaux Robert Schuman in an interview with RTL.
Audio in Luxembourgish.
With the vaccine being an Oxford University development, they will not be wanting to make a profit, which means the price will be relatively low, says Dr. Schockmel.
"One dose is expected to cost between 2 to 3 Euros or Dollars, much lower than the mRNA vaccines. The virus will be produced in India, with around 3 billion doses to be produced this year, allowing us to vaccinate 1.5 billion people worldwide."
This means 1 in 5 people in the world will receive the AstraZeneca vaccine, provided everything goes according to plan.
AstraZeneca has made an official approval request with the EU this week. It is now up to the European Medications Agency to test and approve the vaccine.
According to Dr. Schockmel, the approval process should be relatively painless:
"They filed the same request as in Great Britain and India, where the AstraZeneca vaccine has already been approved. They also have a rolling review with the EMA, which means the agency has already seen and evaluated the data."
Dr. Schockmel is optimistic that the vaccine might be approved as early as 29 January, if everything goes smoothly.
