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Pharma giants GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi Pasteur have announced they will supply 100 million doses of an experimental COVID-19 vaccine to the United States as governments buy up supplies in hopes of securing a candidate that works. The United States will pay up to $2.1 billion “for development including clinical trials, manufacturing, scale-up and delivery” of the vaccine, the two companies based in Europe said in a statement. Sanofi will get the bulk of the funds. (Krka, 7/31)

The Sanofi-GSK vaccine is starting trials behind vaccines of other companies with whom Operation Warp Speed is working, including Moderna — which began a pivotal Phase 3 study aimed at proving its vaccine’s efficacy on Monday — AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, and Novavax. However, it is the only vaccine of the group based on technologies used in approved vaccines: the platform behind Sanofi’s Flublok flu shot, and a compound made by GSK, called an adjuvant, that is used to make vaccines more potent. (Herper, 7/31)

In April, with hospitals overwhelmed and much of the United States in lockdown, the Department of Health and Human Services produced a presentation for the White House arguing that rapid development of a coronavirus vaccine was the best hope to control the pandemic. “DEADLINE: Enable broad access to the public by October 2020,” the first slide read, with the date in bold. (LaFraniere, Thomas, Weiland, Baker and Karni, 8/2)

The Trump administration is hiring consultants with drug industry ties to steer its effort to find a coronavirus vaccine under a contract that allows them to avoid disclosing potential conflicts of interest. The arrangement, which is covered through a $611,500 contract for "Operation Warp Speed," raises more questions about the transparency of the pandemic response and the roles of outside contractors, including top coronavirus vaccine adviser Moncef Slaoui, who are helping steer the government's $10 billion development program. (Diamond, 7/31)