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 President Joe Biden has called the initial phase of the vaccination
campaign a "dismal failure" and with vaccinations in the United
States at around 1 million per day, the new administration wants to
expand and improve the program.
The Trump administration signed an exclusive deal with healthcare
distributor McKesson Corp to ship COVID-19 vaccines for the
government. That distribution system has broadly worked, but it will
face new demands as additional vaccines from Johnson & Johnson and
others are added.
Cardinal Health Inc and AmerisourceBergen Corp, which together with
McKesson are the biggest healthcare product shippers, have made
proposals to take on some distribution. Biden's team is open to the
idea, according to an executive at AmerisourceBergen and two people
familiar with the talks. The Biden administration has not yet made a
decision, they said.
"We stand ready to support the vaccine rollout and are advocating
for the addition of other pharmaceutical distributors to join the
effort," said Heather Zenk, a senior vice president at
AmerisourceBergen in an interview with Reuters. Government officials
were receptive and are considering the proposal, she said, adding
that her company has not "received any formal outreach for
contracting at this point."
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services declined to
comment, saying it is prohibited from sharing information about
contract discussions. McKesson did not comment on talks between the
U.S. and other companies but said it believes the current approach
works best for ensuring safe and fast shipments.
Two vaccines have been authorized for emergency use so far to
inoculate adults in the 330 million population of the United States.
McKesson has handled shipments from Moderna Inc under the
government's Operation Warp Speed program. Pfizer Inc's vaccine is
not part of the government's distribution program.
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 Johnson & Johnson, which is
part of Operation Warp Speed, is releasing data
on its vaccine candidate next week and it could
be authorized in the United States as soon as
February. U.S. officials said in
a press conference earlier this week that they will boost vaccine
shipments from 8.6 million doses each week to at least 10 million in
the coming weeks.
"The current system appears to be faltering at multiple levels so I
do think having more distributors involved is prudent," said Amesh
Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health
Security.
"It will be important however to maintain central coordination," he
added.
Even if the Biden administration does not sign a contract with the
distributors in the near term, it may begin working with them to
actively prepare for a contingency plan should the United States
need additional shipping capacity in the coming weeks or months, one
of the sources said.
(Reporting by Carl O'Donnell in New York and Richa Naidu in Chicago;
additional reporting by Nandita Bose in Washington; editing by Peter
Henderson and Grant McCool)
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