EU threatening to cut off supply of vaccines to UK

[Iremembertheelderlykoreanlady]

Because they've not got enough apparently (despite the fact that they've got a shit load of AZ stockpiled because they've mostly stopped using it)

This is really starting to piss me off now, and has someone who is due 2nd Pfizer jab in 8 weeks in starting to worry I won't get it!

They're threatening to stop supply to USA too.

Wankers

www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/ursula-von-der-leyen-threatens-cut-off-covid-exports-uk-b924652.html

@EasterIssland

There is some news in the Spanish media from the french one today

lexpansion.lexpress.fr/actualite-economique/astrazeneca-le-stock-cache-des-30-millions-de-vaccins-en-italie_2147386.html

But the problem is more likely in Leiden, the Netherlands. This medium-sized city, located about 20 kilometers from The Hague, is the headquarters of the subcontractor Halix, a well-known manufacturer of large laboratories, specializing in viral vectors and recombinant proteins. On April 15, 2020, the latter signed an agreement with the University of Oxford to produce viral vectors for clinical trials. On December 8, Halix signed a new agreement with AstraZeneca to produce the active ingredient for the vaccine on a large scale. To do this, Halix committed to increasing the capacity of two of its production lines. The problem was that a month later, when the European Medicines Agency (EMA) gave the green light to the commercialization of the Anglo-Swedish vaccine, Halix disappeared from the list of subcontractors. The reason was that the EMA had never received all the documents detailing the scientific data necessary for the certification of the Dutch center. "And it is not for lack of having multiplied the requests", says the cabinet of Thierry Breton, European commissioner of the internal market, in charge of supervising the production of vaccines against cholera, that has had to decide to withdraw it from the list. A factory that, according to the information collected by the Express, would have produced since last September the equivalent of four or five million doses per month. The doses that would have been sent for the "fill & finish" to the Italian center of Anagni, owned by the American group Catalent. This means that more than 30 million vaccines would go inactive in Rome, just at the moment when Europe needs them most. When asked about this administrative mess, those responsible for Astrazeneca did not want to answer our questions, simply repeating that this Dutch factory had not received EMA certification, but that "the file was ongoing".

The shelf-life on Ox/AZ is six months. That means the 4 or 5 million doses manufactured in September have sat in a warehouse until they went out of date. The doses made in October are about to expire. Ten million doses, wasted. Obscene. Totally obscene.

If a Dutch owned factory hasn't submitted paperwork to get approval for production to the EU, that's not the UK's fault - that's a Dutch business making a commercial decision to prioritize an existing contract and not risk the EU attempting to claim possession of goods that have already been sold elsewhere.
If the EU could prove that anyone had acted illegally, they'd be showing us that proof. I've yet to see what the UK promised that it hasn't delivered. It's not us threatening to block Pfizer components.

@EasterIssland that is nothing to do with the UK that’s between AZ and the EU. The EU actually banning doses from the UK is down to them.

@MarshaBradyo

Richard North in his eu referendum blog summed the grumble a few days back..

"The Commission President is concerned that 41 million vaccine doses have been exported from the EU to 33 countries in six weeks, with more than ten million going to the UK. That is more than the total administered in the UK during February, and more than a third of the total.

On the other hand, there is no record of UK-produced vaccines being exported to EU Member States, leading von der Leyen to consider whether to impose export controls on products manufactured in Europe, stopping them being sent to the UK."

So "agreed" or not (and AFAIK we await 100% disclosure of unredacted contract details from AZ ) the sentiment in places is that it seems the UK wants to corral all the vaccines it produces, in country, plus hoover up production from elsewhere.

Meanwhile in countries in the EU that have finally got their vacination programmes into gear we're seeing some throttling of the rate due supply shortages.

I can see it works from the UK POV but it's a global problem..if we are going to beat this, and if people expect to travel abroad again from wherever, maybe it's time for a bit of flexibility.

EasterIssland maybe those EU citizens would have been vaccinated if their own governments hadn't put so much effort into undermining AZ and destroying public faith in it!

Maybe the EU would like to stump up for the development costs that the UK has invested in AZ?

@EasterIssland if that’s the case why haven’t the EU dealt with the issue of vials sitting in a warehouse that long! The UK are putting vaccines in people’s arms as quick as possible, we wouldn’t be hanging around for 6 months. They should’ve taken AZ to task over that much sooner but still nothing to do with the UK.

@MrsHuntGeneNotJeremyObviously

EasterIssland maybe those EU citizens would have been vaccinated if their own governments hadn't put so much effort into undermining AZ and destroying public faith in it!

I know! I'm Spanish and I keep seeing what is happening on the other side off the channel... and I keep feeling ashamed about what the governments are doing to the vaccine.

@MrsHuntGeneNotJeremyObviously

Maybe the EU would like to stump up for the development costs that the UK has invested in AZ?

It's not as if the EU has "stiffed" AZ over the vaccine though is it..

Oldish story but of relevance:

www.fiercepharma.com/manufacturing/az-nets-396m-downpayment-for-300m-plus-eu-vaccine-doses

@notimagain I heard EU have not fully paid yet

Quite possibly I don't have access to the books

I think the Uk NHS has done a great job and nobody I know here begrudges the fact, but the media here an be opinion formers as well and some of this is being spun as "they want all the vaccine and then some.

We're only going to get out of this if there is cooperation across all borders so I'm hoping some sense will come out of the next few days meetings.

This is not being covered by uk tabloids or uk breakfast news and i checked rte/ euro news and France 24.

Although az uk is in uk its a private firm..
Logically uk government would have no control over it..
Same with uk firm croda which supplies pfizer bio tech a private company.
I just don't think the current Conservative government and Boris sees himself as libertarian who interfere with their business even if eu blocked.
We have sent components for vaccines to Europe.
We haven't sent final vaccines as we have separate supply chains for az Sweden and az uk they are 2 different companies.
Total credit to our vaccine task force and lawyers keeping some vaccines in uk or we would be stuffed.

I thought initially Oxford wanted to partner with us form merk but government vetoed that idea and said az.
Az don't have massive experience with vaccines they do with other areas pharmaceuticals.
So az were reliant on thier contracted partner firms in all countries they choosing manicure including Europe.
The az interview said a number of factories has struggled with yeild at the beginning and that some are more productive than others.

If halix has been making vaccines 5million a week then where did they all go?
As they can't be used in eu without ema authorisation.
How did you leave 1/ 2 factories off the list.
The eu and Dutch government knew of its existence for months as did we as we sent vaccines task force there to help.
Did halix send to uk. Also other countries.
Or do they have massive stockpile sat there waiting ema to authorise and eu to take.

Why are eu not annoyed with the European firms that are partnered with az .

They can keep using the Royal WE sent vaccines all they liked..
The private companies sent vaccines to the UK as outlined in thier contracts.
UK Sent vaccines components from UK private companies to private vaccine firms some American but based in Europe.

Even that article says that the EU hit snags over payment schedules and costs. If AZ was profit making then I would have a degree of sympathy for negotiating to keep costs down, but it's a not for profit vaccine - haggling over money while EU citizens face a rising death toll is a terrible thing to do.

On the other hand, there is no record of UK-produced vaccines being exported to EU Member States, leading von der Leyen to consider whether to impose export controls on products manufactured in Europe, stopping them being sent to the UK.

@notimagain thank you for giving us the EU perspective. This thread must feel something of a hostile environment at times!

The frustrating thing for me is that UvdL must know that the EU has no contractual entitlement to vaccines produced by AZ UK, because the EU has no contract with them. She's deliberately spreading misinformation, one presumes to attempt to cover up the extraordinary ballsup she made of vaccine procurement in the first place. It's drawing the UK into a dispute which really has nothing to do with us, creating heat not light, and impacting negatively on vaccine rollout on both sides of the channel. None of this is helpful, and the end results is likely more vaccines expiring unused in warehouses.

There is a record of Pfizer components being exported to the EU from the UK. And the UK has invested money and expertise in developing the EU supply chain, which is to the benefit of us all. VDL is very quiet about that. Do ordinary people in the EU even know that if things got really hostile the UK could cut Pfizer supplies in return (not that I think we would or should but you never know with govts). That's a big risk just to cover up VDL incompetence.

Thats a horrible thought so many wasted..vaccines such a valuable commodity I hope that's not the case and they exported to some countries unknown.
Some articles keep repeating the UK hasent made any requests this year to export az from Europe to UK.
But eu saying we know that hit just incase they do make a request.
They trying block something in regards to UK and eu is not happening right now that we are aware of.
No idea when we last received az from Europe.
We rely on Europe for pfizer and soon it was meant to be moderna we have no moderna stock right now Germany and some eu countries do so they have 3.
I thought pfizer had massively upscale their eu production chain.

If there is stockpile in Netherlands out of date or going out if date then halix and az have explain why this is.
But I don't see the eu as blameless why how end march are they pushing for EMA authorisation.

If anyone wishes to listen to the radio interviews this morning, then it was on 'Today' on R4 - available on BBC sounds.

There's an interview with the boss of Valneva shortly after the 1 hour 30 minute point, followed by the interview with a Belgian MEP. Sorry, I didn't catch his name.

It's much more nuanced than some of the discussion here, which is clearly helpful.

@MrsHuntGeneNotJeremyObviously

There is a record of Pfizer components being exported to the EU from the UK. And the UK has invested money and expertise in developing the EU supply chain, which is to the benefit of us all. VDL is very quiet about that. Do ordinary people in the EU even know that if things got really hostile the UK could cut Pfizer supplies in return (not that I think we would or should but you never know with govts). That's a big risk just to cover up VDL incompetence.

apparently some supplies to moderna are British as well. Irish PM said he had been contacted by Moderna as they are worried about the UK blocking the component as a response to the EU block for I've read from this thread or others Bojo has said he'd not block the export of this components

[quote notimagain]@MarshaBradyo

Richard North in his eu referendum blog summed the grumble a few days back..

"The Commission President is concerned that 41 million vaccine doses have been exported from the EU to 33 countries in six weeks, with more than ten million going to the UK. That is more than the total administered in the UK during February, and more than a third of the total.

On the other hand, there is no record of UK-produced vaccines being exported to EU Member States, leading von der Leyen to consider whether to impose export controls on products manufactured in Europe, stopping them being sent to the UK."

So "agreed" or not (and AFAIK we await 100% disclosure of unredacted contract details from AZ ) the sentiment in places is that it seems the UK wants to corral all the vaccines it produces, in country, plus hoover up production from elsewhere.

Meanwhile in countries in the EU that have finally got their vacination programmes into gear we're seeing some throttling of the rate due supply shortages.

I can see it works from the UK POV but it's a global problem..if we are going to beat this, and if people expect to travel abroad again from wherever, maybe it's time for a bit of flexibility.[/quote]
I don’t think this holds. Either the contracts are breached or they’re not.

On a simple level it doesn’t matter if what I buy is produced elsewhere it doesn’t give the state of that country right to requisition it. Under the private contract that is.

Some might argue it’s a pandemic and see the need to go above and beyond the contract. But that won’t be without comment and possibly action from those who would have received the goods under their own contracts.

The Belgian MEP sounded incredibly frustrated, attacking AZ with emotive words. At the same time as having a go re data.

But the EMA have approved it so why bring data up? Either it is approved by regulatory bodies or not.

It’s this contradictory stance which has strange, but also we have have really good systems through legal positions and vaccine approval regulation that would normally resolve this if AZ was in the wrong. And he really sounded as they had been very wrong.

He must be frustrated at a weakened position through the usual channels.

Is strange..

What I am finding slightly outrageous is the way the narrative in Europe (as seen on the FBs of friends based there) seems to be entirely based around the argument that they exported us loads of vaccines and we didn’t export them any- as if the AZ vaccine is entirely a European invention and product rather than the result of a complicated multinational effort in which the UK had something of a role. The way they are talking you would not guess that we had anything to do with creating or funding it.

What I am finding slightly outrageous is the way the narrative in Europe (as seen on the FBs of friends based there)".........."The way they are talking you would not guess that we had anything to do with creating or funding it.

Hate to say it but I'm afraid they need to read around more...

There's been plenty of honest coverage in European media (both print and broadcast) crediting the UK and it's role in funding/development of the Oxford A/Z.

@MarshaBradyo

I don’t think this holds. Either the contracts are breached or they’re not

That's still the 64k question isn't it?

In any event I guess if this becomes all about the contracts to the absolute exclusion of everything else then everybody will suffer more than they have to, including some people in the UK.

[quote notimagain]@MarshaBradyo

I don’t think this holds. Either the contracts are breached or they’re not

That's still the 64k question isn't it?

In any event I guess if this becomes all about the contracts to the absolute exclusion of everything else then everybody will suffer more than they have to, including some people in the UK.[/quote]
Why do you think that Im?

Re the U.K. suffering more than they have to that is.

If we don’t receive the doses won’t we suffer more? Esp if second Pfizer dose doesn’t happen as scheduled.

Sounds stress-making to me to have supply interrupted by another state, outside contract.

The EU won’t get anymore vaccines by blocking our exports, it will just make our rollout go titis up, that sounds vindictive and bitter, not a very good look for the EU