Feds have no single-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine doses to give to provinces

The federal government has no supply of Johnson & Johnson’s single-shot Janssen COVID-19 vaccine to share with the provinces, Health Minister Patty Hajdu said today.

Alberta, Saskatchewan and British Columbia have requested tens of thousands of doses of the vaccine as a way of increasing vaccine uptake. Health Canada has approved the viral vector vaccine but says it is not as effective as its mRNA vaccine equivalents from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

In a news release earlier this week, Premier Jason Kenney said some Albertans in areas of low vaccine uptake have expressed a preference for the Janssen vaccine. The Alberta government has requested 20,000 doses