AstraZeneca has started production of a potential Covid-19 vaccine in order to meet demand should the drug prove effective.
The pharmaceutical company’s chief executive, Pascal Soriot, said the company would know by August whether or not the vaccine works.
“We are starting to manufacture this vaccine right now,” Mr Soriot told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
“And we have to have it ready to be used by the time we have the results.
“Of course, with this decision comes a risk but it is a financial risk and that financial risk is if the vaccine doesn’t work.
“We will find this out at the end of August, then all the materials, all the vaccines we have manufactured, will be wasted.”
He said AstraZeneca would not seek to make a profit from producing the potential vaccine during the pandemic.
The British-Swedish drug-manufacturing giant has pledged to produce 2 billion doses of the vaccine.
It has agreed to supply 300 million doses to the US and a further 100 million to the UK, with the first deliveries expected in September.
Trials to test the drug are underway and have recently been moved from the UK to Brazil, now the epicentre of the pandemic.
AstraZeneca, which is developing the vaccine with scientists from Oxford University, has recently secured two new contracts to help with funding.
One of the new partnerships is with the Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines by volume.
The second is a $750m (£595m) deal with two health organisations backed by Mircrosoft founder Bill Gates and his wife Melinda.
