‘Pfizer now Comirnaty’: Canada renames all COVID vaccines to outdo ‘hesitancy’

In a standard measure to outdo the vaccine hesitancy associated with the jabs, such as Pfizer, Moderna and Oxford manufactures-AstraZeneca (AZ) that have been linked with "very rare" instances of side-effects, Health Canada on Friday renamed the vials with complicated new monikers. According to the local Canadian news outlets, the vaccines in Ottawa will not be labelled as their brand names, but the new names agreed with the manufacturing pharmaceutical companies. The new monikers received full approval from Health Canada under an interim order that expired on September 18. 

Pfizer in Canada will now be called ‘Comirnaty,’ pronounced as koh-MIHR’-nuh-tee, which Pfizer-BioNTech says is a combination of the terms COVID-19, mRNA, community, and immunity. Meanwhile, the Moderna vaccine will now be dubbed as SpikeVax in Canada, and the AstraZeneca vaccine (AZ) will be named Vaxzevria. Stéphane Bancel, Moderna’s CEO, said in a press release on September 17 that it was the first time that its vaccine would be called SpikeVax anywhere in the world. 

“The formulation for Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine is the same formulation as COMIRNATY and they are considered interchangeable by Health Canada to provide the COVID-19 vaccination series. Given the current ongoing pandemic, a gradual transition to new labeling with the COMIRNATY brand name will occur at a later date,” Pfizer said in a press release. 

India's Covishield shot name to remain unchanged

The renaming comes as Canada-approved Pfizer and Moderna vaccines for the population aged 12 and older. AstraZeneca COVID-19 (AZD1222) vaccine will also be renamed but India’s version of the shot Covishield created by the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) and manufactured by Pune’s Serum Institute of India Pvt Ltd will remain unchanged, Canadian Press reported. “These are only name changes. There are no changes to the vaccines themselves,” Health Canada said in a tweet.

Although health experts and critics argued that the new names might cause unnecessary confusion. Ottawa’s Infectious disease specialist Dr Isaac Bogoch wrote on Twitter that he doesn’t care what the vaccines are called but will continue “going with Pfizer, Moderna & AZ,” adding that these rebranded names were difficult to pronounce. United States FDA and EU both approved the new names earlier this summer, and the rebranded names have already been in use for promotional purposes in the EU. 

"Based on the longer-term follow-up data that we submitted, today's decision by Health Canada affirms the efficacy and safety profile of our vaccine at a time when it is urgently needed,” Fabien Paquette, vaccines lead at Pfizer Canada, said in a press release.

Meanwhile, Pfizer stated, “Although the vaccine's brand name will be COMIRNATY following this approval, Canada will continue to receive vials of the vaccine labeled as Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine."

Chief public health officer Dr Theresa Tam, at a press briefing, asked the Canadians to embrace the vaccines saying that unless the Canadians “quickly reduced overall transmission rates through accelerated vaccination where the virus is surging, continued expansion of the epidemic could lead to higher case counts than we have experienced thus far.” Furthermore, she stressed that there were approximately 7 million Canadians not fully vaccinated yet spreading the highly contagious and more severe Delta variant. 

Image: AP