Pfizer has produced more than 70 mln COVID-19 vaccine doses: CEO

The announcement came as the country secured an additional 20 million doses of Pfizer-BioNtech's COVID-19 vaccine, which are expected to be distributed this year.

Pfizer Inc and German partner BioNTech SE had produced over 70 million doses of their COVID-19 vaccine by the end of 2020, Chief Executive Albert Bourla said in an interview on CNBC on Tuesday.

Last week, a spokesman for President-elect Joe Biden said Biden, who takes office next week, would accelerate distribution of COVID-19 vaccines to jump-start lagging inoculations by releasing more doses.

The outgoing HHS secretary blamed states for the slow pace of the rollout, saying some are hewing so closely to prioritization schedules that they are not using the doses they have been allotted. Vaccination allocation so far has been based strictly on a population basis; beginning in two weeks, states that rapidly use their doses will get a larger allocation. "We're now making the full reserve of doses we have available for order, [and] we are 100% committed to ensuring a second dose is available for every American who receives the first dose".

"We are calling on our governors to now vaccinate people aged 65 and over, and under age 65 with a (health condition) because we have got to expand the group", he said.

The province is considering further reducing in-person gathering limits, cutting the opening hours for essential stores like groceries and pharmacies and restricting construction and manufacturing to essential business only.

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"I can tell you the feeling we have after this game, after all that has happened these two days". Zidane, who usually avoids outbursts during news conferences, also vented his anger.

State and local officials are sure to point out that it was the federal government that recommended putting health care workers at the front of the vaccination line. "We're going to hit 1 million people and we need to continue to pick up that pace". "But we [need to] focus on both people at the highest risk of infection and the people at highest risk of severe disease in order to stop this pandemic".

The move to expand eligibility to over 65-year-olds by Trump administration officials "seems well-intentioned, but it is incredibly confusing to the public and disruptive to those trying to implement these programs to keep switching up eligibility every few days", noted Dr. Kelly Moore, deputy director of the nonprofit advocacy group the Immunization Action Coalition and a former immunization manager in Tennessee.

"States have had issues all along, with not knowing how much [vaccine] they're going to get", Hannan said.

Releasing doses that have been held back should bring the total number of doses that have been made available for use in the United States to roughly 38 million, Azar said.

Some states, including Arizona, have or are planning to open up mass vaccination centers, aiming to inoculate thousands of people a day in a single location.