Swiss govt COVID-19 vaccine purchase plan fails to pass parliament

The Swiss parliament has failed to finance the government's plan to buy COVID-19 vaccines in 2023, forcing the cabinet to try to renegotiate contracts with Moderna (Nasdaq: MRNA) and Pfizer (NYSE: PFE)/BioNTech’s (Nasdaq: BNTX) for millions of doses of their vaccines, according to a report from Reuters. The vaccines are marketed as Spikevax and Comirnaty, respectively.

With the two houses of parliament split over the funding request, budget rules required the adoption of the cheaper version of draft legislation, the SDA news agency said.

Parliament approved spending 560 million Swiss francs ($579 million) instead of the requested 780 million francs. That means the government could initially procure only 3.5 million additional vaccine doses each from Moderna and Pfizer/Biontech instead of 7 million each for 2023 it announced in March, Reuters noted.