Pfizer set to launch RSV vaccines for the elderly and pregnant women in the US and Europe

By Maggie Fick

PUURS, Belgium, March 9 (Reuters) – U.S. drugmaker Pfizer is set to roll out its respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine for the elderly and pregnant women in the United States and Europe later this year , according to its officials announced Thursday.

Pfizer and British drugmaker GSK have RSV vaccines they hope to roll out in the United States and Europe this year, pending regulatory approval.

Kena Swanson, head of viral vaccine research and development at Pfizer, told a press conference at the company’s largest manufacturing and packaging facility in the world: “We anticipate approval in the United States US and Europe in time for launch in the fall.

RSV is a leading cause of pneumonia in infants and the elderly, and decades of research have finally led to the two vaccines that Pfizer and GSK are racing to introduce.

Some 14,000 people die each year in the United States from this lower respiratory illness caused by a virus, and analysts predict a multi-billion dollar market for the vaccine by the end of the decade.

GSK told Reuters on Wednesday it was also ready to launch its RSV vaccine for the elderly in the United States this year without supply constraints.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is expected to make a decision on approving the two vaccines in May.

(Reporting by Maggie Fick; editing by Jason Neely and Jane Merriman, editing in Spanish by José Muñoz)