OTTAWA, ON. – It looks like the federal government has found a way to manufacture COVID-19 vaccines on Canadian soil, however that is still a few months down the road.
The Liberals have been under increasing pressure as concerns mount about a serious delay in vials coming from Europe.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said during a media briefing Tuesday morning (Feb. 2) that his government has inked deals to produce coronavirus vaccines in Canada.
“Two companies, Precision NanoSystems and Novavax are now on track to manufacture vaccines right here in Canada. This is a major step forward to getting vaccines made in Canada for Canadians,” Trudeau says.
One facility will be in Montreal with the other in Vancouver.
Health Canada though still needs to approve the Novavax vaccine. The company has said its protein-based COVID-19 vaccine product produced an efficacy rate of 89.3% in late stage clinical trials, with strong protection against the U.K. variant.
Once these facilities are ready to go and receive approval, likely by late this year, they’ll be able to produce some two million doses of vaccines of all types every month.
“We need as much domestic capacity for vaccine production as possible,” says Trudeau.
The Prime Minister again reiterated Tuesday that every Canadian who wants a COVID vaccine will have one by the end of September.
The federal government has been facing several questions in recent weeks regarding COVID-19 vaccines and the fact we have to depend on delivery from other countries.