By Hailey Konnath

Law360 (February 11, 2021, 10:28 PM EST) -- The Biden administration on Thursday ordered a total of 200 million additional doses of the COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer Inc. and Moderna Inc., purchases that mean all Americans could be vaccinated by the end of the summer, according to President Joe Biden.

The federal government shelled out about $2 billion to Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, and $1.65 billion to Moderna for the additional doses, according to a joint statement from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the U.S. Department of Defense.

Biden announced the purchases while speaking at the National Institutes of Health, where he was visiting researchers working to combat the pandemic. The president said that the government has now secured 600 million doses of the vaccine from the drugmakers, and delivery of those doses has been moved up by a month.

"We're now on track to have enough supply for 300 million Americans by the end of July," Biden said.

Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, along with Moderna, plan to deliver the doses in regular increments through the end of that month, HHS and the DOD said.

Acting HHS Secretary Norris Cochran said in a statement Thursday that the purchases allow the federal government to accelerate its vaccine effort. Still, he cautioned Americans to continue to take safety precautions.

"While we rapidly ramp up the pace of vaccinations, I encourage everyone to take actions now to protect themselves and their families: wear a mask, wash your hands often and practice physical distancing," Cochran said.

Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said in a statement that the company continues to scale up its manufacturing capabilities, both in the U.S. and abroad.

"We appreciate the confidence that the U.S. government has demonstrated in our COVID-19 vaccine," Bancel said.

Moderna said it's on track to deliver the first 100 million doses of the vaccine in the first quarter of 2021 and the second order of 100 million doses in the second quarter.

Pfizer and BioNTech didn't immediately return requests for comment late Thursday.

The Biden administration's timeline could be shortened even more if Johnson & Johnson garners U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for its single-shot COVID-19 vaccine candidate. The company asked the FDA for emergency authorization of its vaccine last week, and the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee said it planned to discuss the request at a Feb. 26 meeting.

On Dec. 10, the FDA gave its first stamp of approval to a COVID-19 vaccine when it signed off on Pfizer's authorization. The first doses of that vaccine were administered to front-line health care workers in the U.S. in mid-December. Pfizer's and BioNTech's two-dose vaccine is about 95% effective, according to the agency.

The FDA then approved Moderna's vaccine, which is 94% effective at preventing infection among individuals 18 and older, on Dec. 18.

Those drugmakers lodged their emergency use authorization requests with the FDA in late November.

The vaccines are available to Americans at no cost. As of Thursday, 68.3 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines had been delivered, with 46.4 million of those having been administered, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. About 11.2 million individuals have received both doses required for protection against the virus.

The U.S. reported more than 27.1 million cases in the last month, per the CDC. About 470,000 people have died of the virus in the U.S. since the beginning of the pandemic.

--Additional reporting by Dorothy Atkins, Kevin Stawicki and Britain Eakin. Editing by Regan Estes.

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