(Bloomberg) -- The Biden administration announced plans Friday to use the Defense Production Act to boost supplies for manufacturing of Pfizer Inc.'s Covid-19 vaccine and to ramp up availability of at-home virus tests.
Priority ratings will give Pfizer first access to raw materials, allowing the company to increase manufacturing and meet its delivery targets, Tim Manning, Covid-19 supply coordinator, said at a White House briefing.
Six new companies also will surge production of at-home tests to make more than 60 million such tests available by the summer, according to Manning.
“This amounts to the first sequence of actions under the Defense Production Act that we've taken under the Biden administration in over the last couple of weeks,” Manning said. The Trump administration had used the DPA frequently throughout its pandemic response.
The announcements also included news of an investment into domestic production of surgical gloves and plans to send 1,000 military personnel to support state vaccination sites.
Read more: The Law That Biden Says He'd Use More to Fight Virus: QuickTake
©2021 Bloomberg L.P.
Essential Business Intelligence, Continuous LIVE TV, Sharp Market Insights, Practical Personal Finance Advice and Latest Stories — On NDTV Profit.
