Some pharmacists and doctors say there is a simple solution to the shortage of coronavirus vaccines, through a tested and real method of collecting leftover doses from used vials to produce additional doses.
According to NBC News, this method is called "pooling," and it has been used for several years to increase the supply of medications ranging from flu vaccines to chemotherapy drugs. Some pharmacists indicated that pooling the excess liquid could potentially increase the amount of available coronavirus vaccines by up to 10% using the same supply of vials.
Additionally, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration stated that since the vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna do not contain preservatives, pooling what remains in used vials could lead to drug contamination, which some other experts have also agreed upon. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there are 10 doses in each vial of the Moderna coronavirus vaccine, but the agency warns pharmacists that they must discard the vial when there isn’t enough left to obtain a full dose.
The CDC added that leftover vaccine should not be pooled from several different vials to obtain a full dose. "While some pharmacy experts stated that if the leftover vaccine doses are used immediately, the risk of contamination would be extremely low. Stephanie Ferreri, a distinguished professor and researcher at the University of North Carolina Eshelman School of Pharmacy, told NBC News that if that vial is not used immediately, the risk of contamination is indeed high, but if the vial is used right away and the remnants are combined with vaccine taken from a new vial with the same lot number, the risk of contamination is undoubtedly very low."
