Drug companies refocusing efforts on vaccines, leading to other shortages

The vaccine rollout effort has disrupted the medicine supply chain. Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer is now reporting shortages of birth control after the company reorganized its priorities to producing COVID-19 shots.

For more than 40 years, Cypress Pharmacy has helped people get the medical care they need, but this year, it’s harder.

“There’s been instances where there’s been no product available. Meds that people have been on for 20 years – there’s just nobody to produce it,” said T.J. DePaola, pharmacist in charge at Cypress Pharmacy.

He said the pandemic has led to all kinds of medication shortages [list].

“The one that hit first was a lot of the injectables. A lot of the doctor’s offices were having trouble getting injectable lidocaine, which they use before the procedures.”

The latest on the list: Pfizer’s Depo-Provera. The company shifted production of the birth control shot to the coronavirus vaccine.

“They have to prioritize, and they have to sacrifice one thing to be able to make room for another,” said Dr. Tinglong Dai, a professor at Johns Hopkins University Carey Business School.

“Pfizer has to basically reduce the capacity reserved for other drugs.”

Dai said that’s because of the federal government’s Defense Production Act.

“The Biden Administration wants to prioritize vaccine production, so they invoke the Defense Production Act. So now, these production facilities, they have to prioritize vaccine manufacturing. And so they, so they actually need to delay the production for other drugs.”

Dai believes the production delay is temporary, but there’s a way the federal government can prepare for the next health care crisis without forcing manufacturers and patients to make any sacrifices.

“Although we have a lot of production facilities, the capacity overall is very tight,” Dai said.

“The government should start building a little bit of non-for-profit vaccine manufacturing facility. And that facility does not have to be used all the time, but it could be useful and could be used as the backup option.”

If you take Depo-Provera and can’t get it through your normal pharmacy, Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida said it can help. They aren’t experiencing any interruptions at this time.

Pfizer’s statement on medication shortages: