The European Medicines Agency EMA checks the efficacy and safety of medicines and vaccines before they can be marketed. The agency gives a positive or negative advice to the European Commission to authorize the product.
They are currently reviewing the interim results for three promising vaccines: Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech, and AstraZeneca-Oxford. They make a thorough scientific evaluation of the data that the pharmaceutical companies provide them.
For example, there is a committee full of experts that examines the scientific basis of the vaccines. At the same time, two members of the committee also make a thorough evaluation of all data separately. Only when the benefit-risk analysis is positive at the end of the entire journey is a positive advice given.
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