U.S. to pay over $1 billion for 100 million doses of Johnson & Johnson’s potential COVID-19 vaccine

(Reuters) – The United States government will pay Johnson & Johnson over $1 billion for 100 million doses of its investigational coronavirus vaccine, the drugmaker said on Wednesday.

It said it will deliver the vaccine to Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) on a not-for-profit basis to be used after approval or emergency use authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

J&J’s investigational vaccine is currently being tested on healthy volunteers in the United States and Belgium in an early stage study.

(Reporting by Shariq Khan in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)