New York governor asks Pfizer to directly sell Covid-19 vaccine doses

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo asked Pfizer Inc Chief Executive Albert Bourla on Monday if the state could buy Covid-19 vaccine doses directly from the US drugmaker.

Pfizer, however, told Reuters that such a proposal would first require approval by the US Department of Health and Human Services.

“With hospitalizations and deaths increasing across the country this winter, we are in a footrace with the virus, and we will lose unless we dramatically increase the number of doses getting to New Yorkers,” Cuomo said in a letter to Pfizer’s CEO.

“After myself and seven other governors called on the Trump Administration to release more doses, HHS Secretary Alex Azar said that relief was on the way. To date, however, the federal government has not acted on that promise,” Cuomo wrote.

Cuomo said he was appealing to Pfizer directly as the company was “not bound by commitments” that Moderna Inc made as part of Operation Warp Speed, the US government’s program to distribute Covid-19 vaccines.

No state has purchased vaccines directly from the producer. Cuomo’s letter did not state how many doses he was seeking or how he would pay for it.