Feds 'Mutually' Cut Contract With Vaccine Manufacturer After Tainted J&J Doses Report

The U.S. government has terminated its contract with vaccine manufacturer Emergent BioSolutions eight months after a report found that it tainted doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccines at one of its factories. Emergent is set to lose out on $180 million over the lost contract, CNBC reports.

In an earnings report released on Thursday, Emergent announced a "mutual agreement with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to terminate the Company's 2012 Center for Innovation in Advanced Development and Manufacturing (CIADM) contract" in favor of a "public-private partnership for pandemic preparedness." It maintains that it will continue to work with the government on expanding manufacturing for COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutic candidates.

There was no mention of the March contamination incident in the report.

According to the results of an earlier investigation by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of an Emergent facility in Baltimore, it noted that the location was “not maintained in a clean and sanitary condition” and was “not of suitable size, design, and location to facilitate cleaning, maintenance, and proper operations.”

It is estimated that up to 15 million doses of the J&J vaccine were contaminated after being mixed with ingredients made for the AstraZeneca vaccine.

In their own statement following the FDA report, Emergent reaffirmed that "safety and quality are our top priorities" and said that it was able to identify what it said was a single batch of drug substances that did not meet their quality standards before isolating and disposing of it. The company lamented that such instances were "disappointing" but that they occasionally happen and they remain confident that they were meeting FDA requirements.

Shares of the company, however, did not respond well to the initial news of the termination of the HHS contract, falling over 42% in value on Friday, CNBC reported.

In a comment to the outlet, a spokesman for Emergent said that the move was "mutually agreed upon terminations for convenience and neither party is alleging breach of default by the other."