Pfiz­er gets an FDA fast-pass for an old vac­cine with po­ten­tial mil­i­tary ap­pli­ca­tions

Pfiz­er spent the last year in a heat­ed race to de­vel­op the world’s first coro­n­avirus vac­cine and the last few years jock­ey­ing with Mer­ck and oth­ers to de­vel­op a se­quel to their block­buster pneu­mo­coc­cal vac­cine, Pre­vnar. Now the FDA is giv­ing the New York drug­mak­er an ex­pe­dit­ed re­view for an in­oc­u­la­tion few were watch­ing — one, in fact, that has al­ready been in use for decades.

Pfiz­er has re­ceived pri­or­i­ty re­view for Tico­V­ac, their vac­cine for tick-borne en­cephali­tis, set­ting the com­pa­ny up for a de­ci­sion by Au­gust. If ap­proved, Pfiz­er said, the vac­cine could be giv­en to Amer­i­cans, in­clud­ing armed ser­vice mem­bers, trav­el­ing to re­gions where the virus is com­mon, such as Eu­rope and parts of Asia. It would po­ten­tial­ly pro­tect trav­el­ers against menin­gi­tis and long-term neu­ro­log­i­cal symp­toms the virus can trig­ger.

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