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A corona vaccine has been approved for the first time in the USA.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted the vaccine from Mainz-based biotech company BioNTech and its partner Pfizer an emergency approval on Friday evening.
This applies to people aged 16 and over, the FDA announced.
The first vaccinations are expected in the next few days.
According to media reports, the White House is said to have previously urged the head of the FDA, Steven Hahn, with threats for immediate emergency approval of the corona vaccine.
The Washington Post reported that White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, asked Hahn on Friday to submit the resignation if the vaccine from Mainz-based company Biontech and its US partner Pfizer is not approved before the end of the day (local time).
The New York Times reported that Meadows had told Hahn that if he did not, he should consider looking for another job.
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Several US media confirmed the reports.
Hahn himself spoke in a statement to the US media, however, of "an untrue representation of the phone call with the chief of staff".
The FDA was "encouraged" to process the application from Biontech and Pfizer quickly.
"The FDA is determined to give this approval quickly." The "New York Times" reported that the agency had originally planned the approval for Saturday morning.
It is unclear what the advantages of accelerating approval by half a day.
The elected US President Donald Trump also increased the pressure on the FDA on Friday.
He criticized the agency as a "big, old, slow turtle".
He wrote on Twitter: "Give the damn vaccines out now, Dr.
Rooster.
Stop playing games and start saving lives !!! ”Trump had repeatedly put political pressure on the agency in the past to approve corona vaccines and therapies, and was criticized for it .
Trump also sees the rapid development of a corona vaccine as his success.
An advisory committee of the FDA had spoken out on Thursday in favor of granting emergency approval of the vaccine for Biontech and Pfizer for people aged 16 and over.
At the meeting held by video link, 17 of the experts voted for admission, 4 voted against.
The recommendation of the advisory committee is not binding, but the authority usually follows the recommendations of the experts.
It is now the first corona vaccine approved in the United States.
The US government had contractually secured the delivery of 100 million vaccine doses from Pfizer / Biontech.
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On Wednesday, the number of deaths in the United States had exceeded 3,000 in a single day for the first time since the pandemic began.
According to statistics from Johns Hopkins University, the number of new infections registered was more than 200,000 in the past few days.
Future US President Joe Biden announced on Tuesday a 100-day program to combat the pandemic, which he intends to implement immediately after taking office on January 20.
Part of the plan is to give at least 100 million doses of a vaccine by that time.
Biden called the high number of coronavirus deaths a "tragic milestone".
"More than 3,000 dead in a single day, the highest single death toll during this pandemic," he said on Friday in Wilmington, Delaware.
"That's more deaths in a single day than we had on 9/11 or in Pearl Harbor." In his remarks, Biden referred to the attacks of September 11, 2001 in New York and Washington, as well as the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor (Hawaii) in December 1941. He again called on the US Congress to end the months of tug-of-war and to decide on a new aid package in the crisis.
The pharmaceutical company Moderna announced on Friday that the US government was buying another 100 million doses of its vaccine candidate.
These cans would be delivered in the second quarter of next year.
Of the first 100 million units already purchased by the US, 20 million would be shipped this month, the remaining 80 million in the first quarter of 2021. The US would also have the option to buy another 300 million cans from Moderna.
The Moderna vaccine has yet to be approved by the FDA.