Why should the UK vaccine supply be diverted to Europe?

[lovelemoncurd]

They ordered 3 months later than the UK. They have themselves less time to sort glitches. They have been slow to the table and now they wish to punish to UK for being efficient.

I was a remain voter. I'm starting to change my mind!

Regarding the Pfizer vaccine it makes sense for the EU to withhold it. The delay to the Oxford vaccine means EU countries cannot vaccinate their most vulnerable so why on earth would they give away the vaccines they do have. Those vaccines may have been promised to the U.K. but the Oxford vaccines from the EU clinic we’re promised to the EU and given to the U.K. instead

Regarding the Pfizer vaccine it makes sense for the EU to withhold it. The delay to the Oxford vaccine means EU countries cannot vaccinate their most vulnerable so why on earth would they give away the vaccines they do have. Those vaccines may have been promised to the U.K. but the Oxford vaccines from the EU clinic we’re promised to the EU and given to the U.K. instead

Sold, not promised.

That's why.

@ChardonnaysPetDragon

This is ridiculous.

Threatening to block the Pfizer supply because they think they are not getting the OAZ is very much like me demanding a refund from Ocado because Waitrose misplaced my cucumbers.

Absolutely.

Yesterday we were told that the EU might withhold the importing of Pfizer vaccines to U.K., now 24 hrs later they are insisting that we export our U.K. made vaccines to make up their shortfall. Are we about to be blackmailed?

If that is the case then would AZ be within their rights to withdraw their EU vaccine approval application?

@SaskiaRembrandt it’s not about timing alone it’s the agreement of where the vaccines would come from. So a production and logistics issue.

@joystir59

We developed it so please let's prioritise our own for once!

As I said in my post above - it's not about prioritising our own, it's about ensuring that people whose governments can't afford to run vaccine programmes otherwise are also vaccinated. We'll be fine either way because (and I never thought I'd say this) our government did a good job with our vaccine programme.

Crazycatlady83 -But that absolutely does not fit with the narrative the government have told us right from the beginning that everyone is at risk of covid (long covid) etc., we can’t afford to vaccinate the world if are economy isn’t moving and to get out of lockdown, a lot more people want to be vaccinated outside the top 9 priority groups

Yes everyone is at risk from covid but in order to massively reduce the death toll and ensure that health systems are not overwhelmed we just need to ensure that frontline health care workers and the most vulnerable parts of the population are vaccinated. This amounts to about 20% of the population of most countries.

We absolutely can afford to vaccinate 20% of the world's population. It will cost $28BN. The UK could probably cover that alone (I am not at all suggesting we do - ALL wealthy nations need to step up on this).

The study I linked to above 'shows that those economies and sectors with a high degree of international exposure will bear the brunt of economic losses' if we don't prioritise equitable vaccine distribution. That's us. Our economy will not move smoothly for a long long time if the countries we rely on for raw materials, various stages of manufacture etc. are still stuck in lockdown, scrabbling around burying their dead and trying to source oxygen.

Everyone (aside from anti-vaxxers) wants the vaccine, for themself, for their family, friends, community and country. It's completely understandable that people want to look after their own first. It's very short sighted though. Everyone in the UK will be offered a vaccine in the not too distant future but for the moment, we have an extremely limited supply and we should be using it in the most effective way possible which is not to vaccinate everyone in some countries and no-one in other countries.

That German MEP!
European citizens won't be treated as 'second class' and Astra Zenaca and the UK 'better think twice' or will 'face consequences' such as blocking exports of the Pfizer vaccine to the UK.

With apologies for posting already on another thread...

It's all very interesting, but obviously no one has seen both contracts other than AZ, so really who knows. I would be VERY surprised if the CEO of AZ didn't have a strong basis for this - he will have had lawyers crawling all over the agreements weeks ago before breaking the bad news to the EU, so the relevant clauses should have been very well studied.

Clearly, "best endeavours" could mean lots of things in this context. In English law, it doesn't require you to break a binding legal commitment with someone else to deliver something where you are legally committed to that third party to do so (ie not best endeavours), so if that is what the U.K. has, it does get priority over "best endeavours" to someone else. Whether, if this is the set up, the EU understood this at the time (although clearly Soriot suggests that it was understood that the game plan was that supplies would be made from a continental factory at least initially) is a clearly a live issue.

The export of vaccines to the U.K. from the EU factory is an interesting one - I have no idea whether AZ decided they needed to go to the U.K. because the EU hadn't approved the vaccine yet and there might be storage/distribution issues, because the U.K. has absolute priority in its contract or whether this looks more like a breach in retrospect because they couldn't deliver to the EU - 4m doses was quite significant to the U.K. obviously, but not so much to the EU really, so it isn't that relevant to the main issue at hand in terms of the delays on the wider contract for far far more doses than this 4m. Bit of a red herring in the grand scheme of things these initial doses.

I am a remainer and have no real beef with the EU (from my dealings with them as a lawyer, it is pretty bureaucratic and needs reform, but I thought it was far better to stay in and try to advocate from the inside) but I do have limited sympathy for a party who really took their time and invested less in order not to take the risk of backing a loser (but backed the french vaccine anyway for political reasons) and then expects to be able to obtain the same level of priority. Risk and reward are usually linked. But sympathy is not really relevant - it is the terms of the contract that really count. We just don't know!

Almost a reason to support Brexit EXCEPT the vaccination is entirely based on European research and funding. Without cooperation between different nation states there would be no vaccine to begin with.
And this is a global pandemic. Everyone has to be aligned in their vaccination programs or it will keep coming back. The Black Death occurred before high speed trains and Airbuses remember.
Nationalism doesn’t and never will help.

@ChardonnaysPetDragon similar to how Astra sold vaccines to the EU to the tune of €336 million and are now not giving them to the EU??

@FitzsimmonsMarvel, you think the EU wanted Astrazeneca to stockpile the vaccine for them all through December and January when they hadn't approved the vaccine and it could be used to save lives elsewhere? Surely not. That would be immoral during a pandemic.

@MessAllOver

Lots of people would like to get the vaccine. The question is whether a young person in the UK should be vaccinated before an elderly or vulnerable person elsewhere.

If the UK paid for the vaccines, then they get to decide who receives them. And they're going to vaccinate their population before thinking of others. Just as the US and EU will do. And just as you would make sure your family are taken care of before thinking about strangers. That's just the way it is.

@IcedPurple *
Plus, this 'vaccinate the world' thing also has an obvious element of self-interest, in the sense that we need to have the virus at low levels globally in order for travel and trade to resume at normal levels. There's no urgent desire to find a cure for malaria for example, which still kills about half a million every year. Just not in rich countries.

Incorrect. The purpose of vaccinating the world is to prevent further spread with the inevitable mutation of the virus to one which is not controlled by the vaccine

[quote FitzsimmonsMarvel]@SaskiaRembrandt it’s not about timing alone it’s the agreement of where the vaccines would come from. So a production and logistics issue.[/quote]
I think we'll to agree to disagree. IMO production and logistics are a red herring. AZ had a contract to fill and they did that using the supplies they had to hand - and timing is crucial because the EU had not approved the vaccine and still haven't. They were warned about production issues but still dragged their heels.

Venturing into tin foil hat territory, I think they put too many eggs in too few baskets and ended up with one abandoned vaccine and another that won't be available for months. They've now realised the impossibility of mass vaccination using Pfizer and are panicking.

What I think is worth bearing in mind is that some of the extra vaccines that Germany bought (outside of the rules of the EU) were where poorer countries in the EU had decided not to buy their allocation. So I would be very surprised if there wasn't a fair amount of anger from those member states towards Germany.

@ScribblingPixie agreed - so that went to the U.K. but now the U.K. plants won’t give the required numbers purchased to the EU - hence the whole debacle! It’s not the EU ‘stealing the U.K. vaccine’ despite the hysteria on here. They were promised X amount from an EU plant. This went to the U.K. instead. Now the EU are saying ok give us the amount purchased from the U.K. plants and Astra are saying oh no in the contract you signed we said U.K. plants fulfil U.K. contracts first ergo giving all supply to U.K. over the EU. So you can see why they are not accepting that especially when they’ve already given the firm €336 million

Incorrect. The purpose of vaccinating the world is to prevent further spread with the inevitable mutation of the virus to one which is not controlled by the vaccine

It's not 'incorrect'. Viruses only spread from one country to another through travel, so my point that international travel cannot return to normal unless a sizeable proportion of the world's population is innoculated still stands.

@SaskiaRembrandt

The UK has now mobilised $1 billion from global donors to support vulnerable countries to access coronavirus vaccines – stopping the spread of the disease.

I believe the eu has put less money into this programme as per what I’ve read

www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-raises-1bn-so-vulnerable-countries-can-get-vaccine

@Wildswim

That German MEP! European citizens won't be treated as 'second class' and Astra Zenaca and the UK 'better think twice' or will 'face consequences' such as blocking exports of the Pfizer vaccine to the UK.

I haven't read/seen the German MEPs statement but I thought I had read earlier that no MEPs have actually seen the AZ-EU contract so I'm not sure what that outburst is based on. Sounds like there is a massive deflection and bottom covering exercise going on.

@IcedPurple the U.K. did not ‘pay for the vaccines’ - what utter nonsense. It was developed and paid for by multiple countries including the EU! The US alone gave them 1 billion in funding back in May 2020.

Honestly so much nonsense on this thread from posters who seem to think it was only British money, British workers and British ideas that made the vaccine.

[quote EasterIssland]@SaskiaRembrandt

The UK has now mobilised $1 billion from global donors to support vulnerable countries to access coronavirus vaccines – stopping the spread of the disease.

I believe the eu has put less money into this programme as per what I’ve read

www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-raises-1bn-so-vulnerable-countries-can-get-vaccine[/quote]
Apparently it's 500 million from the EU. As far as I'm aware, after Trump pulled out, the UK became the biggest donor, although that may have changed.

Yes, they will get their vaccines when they are ready.

So imagine you are in a shop, it's the sales, you see a great pair of shoes. There are other customers browsing there, they like the shoes but they need the approval of their whole family to buy them. You think, sod that, snap them up, you pay, but because you are still shopping you leave them at the collection point to pick up later. I remember Selfridges did that. The other customer then comes along and demands your shoes. No fucking way. They are mine. Find your own shoes.

So, yes, along those lines.

[quote FitzsimmonsMarvel]@IcedPurple the U.K. did not ‘pay for the vaccines’ - what utter nonsense. It was developed and paid for by multiple countries including the EU! The US alone gave them 1 billion in funding back in May 2020.

Honestly so much nonsense on this thread from posters who seem to think it was only British money, British workers and British ideas that made the vaccine.[/quote]
Nobody thinks that, don't be so patronising. The UK did pay for the vaccines they bought as a result of signing a contract with AZ.

@IcedPurple. But there is really no need to 'take care' of most healthy young people by vaccinating them. The risk is minute.

It's a bit like insisting your mid-20s brother, who is a strong swimmer, gets a place in the lifeboat when the ferry sinks 100 metres from shore because there's a miniscule chance he might get eaten by a shark while swimming to shore. Meanwhile, you leave the frail pensioner, who can't swim, on a sinking boat to drown just because he isn't related to you.

so that went to the U.K. but now the U.K. plants won’t give the required numbers purchased to the EU - hence the whole debacle!

Supposedly that was 4 million doses, a relatively trifling amount. That's not the 'whole debacle.

It’s not the EU ‘stealing the U.K. vaccine’ despite the hysteria on here.

I have seen no hysteria here. The only hysteria I see is coming from EU 'leaders'.

They were promised X amount from an EU plant.

Where were they 'promised' anything from a specific plant? The AZ CEO said it was always clear that Britain's order was to be fulfilled first, not an organisation which has treated the whole thing with a shocking lack of urgency.