To think that the EU have done more to endorse Brexit in the last 2 weeks than the UK managed in nearly 5 years

[Butterflyfluff]

I’ll start by saying I’ve never thought Brexit was in the long term interest of the UK and still don’t

But dear God, the EU’s behaviour over vaccinations and, in particular, the blatant prejudice around the Astra Zeneca vaccine has done more to endorse the UK leaving than anything that has been said in the UK before, during and after the vote

@LoadsOfTrouble within the eu the uk could not of signed deals as early as it did with az , pfizer etc
We would also not of been able to approve the vaccines when we did
The same as all the other 27 eu countries
On another thread there is an article stating that by stopping these exports the eu will gain hardly anytime as in the grand scheme of things the uk orders will barely make an impact , it will put the uk behind more though
One other thing is the uk is having a big gap between doses to get more people vaccinated , the eu are not so will not get to the age groups as quick , but some eu citizens will have 2 jabs long before uk citizens will

Imagine for a moment that the situation were reversed, with the UK short of vaccines and the EU not. Compared to the screaming and shouting Brexiters would be doing then, the EU is fairly low-key.

No, I think people in the UK would blame their own government - as they did with PPE shortages. But from what I've read, it was actually the PPE crisis and the lack of cooperation and help between countries over that that taught them that they needed to be meticulous in planning the UK's vaccine strategy and looking after our own interests.

This case was particularly reported - France blocked PPE that was contracted to the NHS:
www.euronews.com/2020/03/06/coronavirus-french-protective-mask-manufacturer-scraps-nhs-order-to-keep-masks-in-france

To clarify - the EU are not sending doses here. There are commercial contracts between the UK and factories in the EU which result in vaccines being sent here. The commercial contracts made by the EU did not result in them currently being in a position to receive stock from the UK. These weren't political decisions - they were commercial ones. They are not doing us a favour "sending us vaccines." But they will be deliberately harming us to politically intervene in legally binding commercial contracts to stop the UK receiving the doses it's legally entitled to.

@PigletJohn

The EU has behaved very unreasonably.

EU has sent over nine million doses to UK

UK has sent zero doses to EU.

Yep, there's certainly somebody not being very co-operative.

But who is it?

Does anybody, seriously, expect that pattern to continue?

That's not how these things work, is it? It's not like disaster relief aid where a government pays for and sends supplies across to another nation, the EU has sent nothing. Private companies happen to be in the business of trading across borders, nothing to do with governments. The UK had contracts with the likes of AZ and Pfizer to produce vaccines. Some of these happened to be produced in EU member states. Nothing to do with the EU, entirely to do with supply chain decisions made by private companies.

The EU also had contracts with pharmaceutical firms. These firms have not yet used UK factories for these contracts because those factories were already committed to other orders. There are however some UK factories involved in the supply chain for EU orders though.

There of course came a snag where a private company was struggling to fulfil its order to one of its customers. The customer went "can't we have some of another customer's order to keep us going?". That couldn't be done because the other customer had signed its contract under English law which offers far better protections to the customer than Belgian law. Therefore if the private company had allowed political pressure to divert its product, the second customer would have been able to invoke penalty clauses. The first customer on the other hand (the one who signed under Belgian law) can't actually do any more than withhold payment.

At no point should any of this have anything to do with UK-EU relations. It's all between private companies and their customers. Neither party has any need to "be cooperative" with the other on vaccines because issues between the EU and one of its suppliers are not any of the UK government's business, and vice versa.

In a populist tantrum, UvdL has threatened to interfere with the legitimate passage of goods between supplier and customer. Doing so would collapse commercial confidence in the EU, causing manufacturers to rethink whether they can trust the long-term stability of the bloc when the circle of stars have effectively been replaced with the Jolly Roger. This comes on top of the same individual moving to close the Irish border just in case the UK should attempt to engage the Hawkhurst Gang to smuggle doses into the UK that way.

(If anyone thinks that my pirate and smuggler analogies are a little preposterous, that's exactly how ridiculous UvdL's behaviour is)

Very pro eu still but dismayed about what's been going on regarding vaccines. Mostly because, when it comes down to it, we need as many people vaccinated as possible everywhere. The hullabaloo about AZ has made people here hesitant about vaccines of all kinds as well as abroad.

Whatever people say defending the eu here, their rate of vaccinations and their upcoming targets are worryingly slow. I've not seen slagging off of (expensive) Pfizer. And yet AZ and Pfizer efficacy seems to broadly similar. There's been dissing of AZ worldwide from the get go. Macron has been outrageous in his comments on AZ.

Our high death toll and Johnson's incompetence and cronyism etc, the fact that after the pandemic is over we'll still be suffering from leaving the eu and a seemingly successful vaccine roll out in the U.K. are not mutually exclusive things. Anyone who suggest they are; either way is delusional.

The EU's actions do seem desperate.
The roll-out is a shambles in Ireland and other EU countries numbers rising, it is bloody hopeless. 😢

@SoWhyNot

I wish we were still in the EU but having done our own thing over the vaccines, which would have been unlikely.

It would have been possible though - joining the EU procurement effort wasn't mandatory for EU countries. The only thing that would have been guaranteed if the UK had been in the EU is that the EU wouldn't have been able to threaten to ban exports of vaccine to the UK, because the single market rules make such bans quite difficult.

@SpringisSpinning

Oh no!! Imagine being dragged into these arguments with our high death rate, I also don't understand why eu citizen don't feel more angry.

Imagine vaccines here sat unused in warehouses.

Maybe because Nick Ferrari and Rupert Murdoch aren't telling them to feel angry. And because they're reading everywhere that the UK has exported 0 vaccines whereas the EU have send a big number. And that they know that the vaccines they've paid for aren't being delivered not last quarter nor this one, whereas the company they paid is still delivering 100% to a country vaccinating 17 year olds who once had a headache (as per one mumsnet thread). Maybe.

Well said @ Quentin. Yet another bashing the eu thread!

The UK absolutely could have opted out of joint procurement. Whether it would or not is a different question, but membership of the EU was not an automatic blocker to doing what the UK has done.

I’m not massively impressed by the EU on vaccines - particularly Macron casting aspersions on AZ efficacy - but it doesn’t make me glad we left

The UK absolutely could have opted out of joint procurement. Whether it would or not is a different question, but membership of the EU was not an automatic blocker to doing what the UK has done.

We really mustn't let facts get in the way of trying to spin Brexit as a good idea!

@Binkybix

The UK absolutely could have opted out of joint procurement. Whether it would or not is a different question, but membership of the EU was not an automatic blocker to doing what the UK has done.

I’m not massively impressed by the EU on vaccines - particularly Macron casting aspersions on AZ efficacy - but it doesn’t make me glad we left

The problem with this argument, is that everybody knows full well we wouldn't even gone separate. Historically, we COULD HAVE gone separate on many things, we never ever did.

One thing that's quite eye opening about this thread, although not in the least surprising to me, is the number of remain voters willing to criticise the EU and even rethink Brexit. In all the years post Brexit leave voters are absolutely welded to Brexit there is NOTHING that will cause them even a moment's reflection. If this situation was reversed and we were way behind the EU on vaccines and this was precisely BECAUSE of Brexit I would have been amazed if a single Leave voter had moved one inch.

@Butterflyfluff

spring how else do you explain the fact that Merkel didn’t want to use it at all then lots of EU countries jumped on the blood clot bandwagon when there was no rationale for either decision

What was the motivation for both of those things?

'the blood clot bandwagon'.
What a nasty thing to say. You think adverse events shouldn't be investigated? Or other countries are not perfectly entitled to pause the use of a medicinal product while the effects investigated? This sort of action is not unique to this vaccine. The problem is that people have only become aware these things happen because the vaccine is in the news.

Many of the components (of which there are hundreds) of the AZ vaccine will be sourced from a supply chain that is outside the UK. AZ have a number of sites in their supply chain and many of the vaccines given in the UK will be made by a company in India - Serum Institute of India. They in turn have trouble manufacturing the vaccines in India as they buy materials from the US. The US have commandeered these materials for use by the US itself.

That is what vaccine nationalism does. We are all dependent on international supply chains.

www.bbc.com/news/uk-56438629

And yes. Most medicines manufacturers would be up the creek without a paddle if cross border trade was stopped. Even lack of simple every day chemicals and products would present a huge problem.

Which bit in particular of Listening quietly's list was incorrect? Where are the syringe and vial manufacturers in the UK? One's that also don't have a supply chain for their products from outside the Uk.

Very pro EU here, but agree their actions over the vaccines have been very odd and ill advised.

Yes unless I’m missing something I agree.

I would really prefer us to be in a massive powerful trading block, with useful travel opportunities for my children to work and study abroad, but the vaccine thing is bizarre.

@donewithitalltodayandxmas

Given their death rates and the rises in infection, many countries in europe are in a far worse state than developing nations..... its about supply - not money.
One of the arguments made in january (by many) was as our rates were so bad, we needed the vaccines more than anyone else! and that once we'd done our 9 at risk groups, we could divert supplies to Covax.... we ain't doing that.

As far as i can see, atm the european supply of vaccine is finite, eu has used up about 50m doses, the uk 30m.(approx) surely if the EU had better supplies, they'd have had more and the UK less?

i thought they were now leaving a large doses gap?

Developing nations wont get vaccines until late '22... why? because the rich nations have either got it or it s on order with watertight contracts.

@ScribblingPixie

Imagine for a moment that the situation were reversed, with the UK short of vaccines and the EU not. Compared to the screaming and shouting Brexiters would be doing then, the EU is fairly low-key.

No, I think people in the UK would blame their own government - as they did with PPE shortages. But from what I've read, it was actually the PPE crisis and the lack of cooperation and help between countries over that that taught them that they needed to be meticulous in planning the UK's vaccine strategy and looking after our own interests.

No they did not... at no point has Labour ever been ahead in the polls over Johnson and the Tories.... now 15pts behind. Carehomes, PPE, 4m on NHS waiting lists, one of the highest death rates in the world, schools fiasco, slow slow and slow again in following scientific advice that allowed the "kent" variant to spread and is now sweeping through europe.

No the public support him to the hilt as they do cutting foreign aid.

Our own interests are served by a close relationship with europe because ultimately, thats where our trade flows, Migrants, Russia, education, history & culture are all closely aligned.

I think what people are not seeing/thinking is that we have left the protection of the EU. They will inevitably react to protect member states.
The whole ‘blame the EU propaganda is to hide the devastation caused by mismanagement of the pandemic this far by an extremely right wing government and the catastrophic impact of Brexit.

Johnson is selling ‘his’ vaccine and taking credit for something he had very little to do and people are seeing it as a miracle when the reality is the one of the highest death rates in the world because of poor decision making. One of the worst funded healthcare systems in the developed world. Mile long queues for foodbanks. Several industries collapsing because of lies. Civil liberties removed. Misleading the House. Contracts to friends. A track and trace programme that doesn’t work but costs more than a space mission.

The propaganda is effective and we have created a monoculture that supports the ‘I’m alright Jack; each man in his castle’ , blame foreigners and pull up,the drawbridge mentality.

We have lost so much and gained so little- unless you are already very wealthy.

Which bit in particular of Listening quietly's list was incorrect? Where are the syringe and vial manufacturers in the UK? One's that also don't have a supply chain for their products from outside the Uk.

The bits that said there were no vaccines made in the UK and the bits that implied the development was entirely international

I was the only person I knew who voted leave. Got a lot of stick for it from family.

Every single on of them is now very pleased we left.

...and to the PP saying that AZ is not made in the UK. Erm...yes it is!