EU/AZ Court case

[3asAbird]

The 1st Court case is tommorow wed 26th May and should have outcome by end of June.

However the EU logged a 2nd Court case seeing financial compensation as guess they spent more money buying 2nd dose pfizer at higher price.
The 2nd Court case won't be until late September.

AZ saying very little. Be interesting see how this pans out.
Hope it means a better relationship between eu and uk going forward.
It will settle the endless speculation and political tit for tat having a legal judgement.
EU still want AZ vaccines immediately.
But without INDIA exporting I don't know how az Sweden can magic up such large numbers.

www.reuters.com/world/europe/new-eu-legal-case-against-astrazeneca-over-vaccine-supplies-gets-underway-2021-05-11/

indianexpress.com/article/explained/explained-why-has-the-eu-initiated-legal-action-against-astrazeneca-7291254/

Az chief said uk always had priority

www.politico.eu/article/astrazeneca-pascal-soriot-uk-priority-access-coronavirus-vaccine/

Bangladesh have made a request to uk and USA for az doses so they can 2nd dose vaccinate as any supplies from India halted.

No idea whats happening with Australia and AZ as was meant to be made there.
But we know supplied fro Europe 250k were seized from Italy by the the EU.
But AZ uk have shipped quietly to Australia.

We know despite EU claiming export ban the UK has sent pfizer components and the USA has either sent vaccines or raw materials to AZ EU sites so reprocity does exist between UK/ USA I some form so EU saying we hoarding stuff and blocking is simply not true.

If some EU countries not using AZ under 50s I wonder how much EU think they needs surely not their original order.
Seems Johnson and Johnson is being rolled out in the EU despite maybe sharing same risks as AZ.

@Baileysforchristmas

Does anyone really think it’s reasonable for the EU to take all the vaccines from the UK when the UK funded most of the development, trials and setting up the UK sites? Especially when the UK was hit hardest by the pandemic and had the largest number of deaths in Europe?

The EU case is mad.

It is about certain politicians saving face.

Those same politicians will be retired or doing something else when the case is eventually properly heard if an out of Court agreement isn't made by then.

www.politico.eu/article/european-commission-astrazeneca-court-coronavirus-vaccines/

Apologies the conclusion part 2 to trial 1 is next week.
I don't think a Belgian court has jurisdiction to forced uk manufactured doses to be delivered to EU.

@3asAbird

www.politico.eu/article/european-commission-astrazeneca-court-coronavirus-vaccines/

Apologies the conclusion part 2 to trial 1 is next week.
I don't think a Belgian court has jurisdiction to forced uk manufactured doses to be delivered to EU.

The UK ordered AZ before the EU. So like any sale those who order first get first.

The actions of the head of the EU are getting more and more ridiculous. There are other vaccine options.

AZ can't prevent unpredictable delays due to the Issues within India.
Maybe the EU should provide a huge factory for AZ and ship in all the manufacturing products.

They poorly planned and should blame themselves.

I think part of the case is to establish that the delay is due to things beyond AZ's control. What they've done with the money etc.

@Motorina

If the reuters article is correct, then the EU's case in a nutshell I think is that AZ were in breach of the best reasonable efforts principle "because the drugmaker had not delivered to the bloc 50 million doses produced in factories that are listed in the contract as suppliers to the EU, including 39 million doses manufactured in Britain, 10 million produced in the United States and 1 million in the Netherlands."

@Wakeupin2022 my reading is in accord with your own - that the EU case is in essence that every single dose, manufactured anywhere in the world, should have been supplied to the EU.

Does anyone know if today's hearing is it, or if it will be running over a number of days? I'm aware that the judgement is not anticipated for a few weeks yet.

Isn’t that the general view of the case anyway. Not in the U.K. obviously, but elsewhere. Alongside a suspicion that the U.K. contract contains a far more punitive clause for non-delivery than the EU one does.

The idea being that the purchasing agreement that AZ signed with the U.K. shouldn’t have been able to override the reasonable best efforts part of the existing purchasing order with the EU. The reasonable expectation being that, given the 10 plants were in the contract, any supply issues would mean that all the contracts would see a sort of pro-rata drop in supply.

It’s a rupidiculous amount of money they are asking for, and they won’t get it. But I’m guessing the lawyers have gone in high and will leave it to the courts to figure it into a sensible amount.

@Cailleach1

I think part of the case is to establish that the delay is due to things beyond AZ's control. What they've done with the money etc.

I think once that is established, and the world is reminded quite forcefully that this was a humanitarian effort that was supported by X Y and Z, the EU not being any of them, the EU case will look worse and worse.

Sadly I do also thnk that there is going to have to be a lot more time, effort and money spent rebranding AZ to get rid of the taint of this and to further future proof the company!

And that is what I find most despicable. The EU knew, as well as any other faction, that AZ were new to vaccines and were offering the world an at cost remedy. They relied so much on their 'Belgian contract' and didn't stop to think. And when it started to go pear shaped instead of doing what most other countries and organisations were doing at the time, talking, offering aid, money, information, experts etc, they started shouting the oddds.

I think in some ways the EU may have changed the way every country then started to consider their own vaccine and much of the initial spirit of cooperation was stopped, or at least slowed. And that might have set the precedent for any future global issue - get the lawyers in, the EU might sue us!

That and the UK needs to start shouting about its commitments of money and expertise into other countries, hopefully AZ will state that very clearly during the case. From parents in Spain I know that the ex pat community was aware of much of that initially but the Spanish press were not! Possibly that was the same across the EU for a while at least.

How many doses has the EU received so far? EMA approved one month later than MHRA and the article says they will have 100m by end of June, which is 33% of the contract not 18%, while it says UK had 37% of its doses. I.e. almost identical except that UK had a larger order per head of population.

They can't be basing 18% on 400m (72m) because the Additional Doses were optional and cancelled, but that means the EU say they've had 54m doses and I thought it was higher than that.

AZ says that they havendelivered about 60 million so far I think.

The UK was also supposed to get 100 million by end Feb so we should take delivery schedule intonaccount here also.

The contract seems to suggest that only EU plants were to be used for Initial doses but its all a bit clumsy.

I truly don't believe the UK was to supply the EU initially as the 2 supply chains were different. I do think the UK was in the contract because it was a nearby location and it made sense as it was easier for UK to supply EU when there was capacity. That might be an incorrect assumption on my part........

I don't think the EU anger is because AZ had deliver delays. The anger is because its perceived that the UK did better. The EU thought they had a contract that trumped anything with the UK and they wanted to use it as an example of how UK was wrong to leave the EU.

I'm not fan of Brexit Britain but both sides are playing pretty games. This time the EU have tried to pull one over the UK and failed spectacularly. Next time it will probably be the other way about.

This whole debacle is not really about AZ, they are just the fall guy... .

*petty

OK if we look at the just the 2 eu production sites

Belgium
Halix Netherlands.
Has az and eu done all they can to boost productivity at those sites?
Other than police raids on az bottling plant in Italy seizing Australia supply and separate raids to Belgium factory to see what other countries orders and are and what they have received how has the eu commission offered practical help to az and thier European pharmaceutical manufacturing partners?
We have been told az uk and uk vaccine task force have gone to Belgium and Netherlands and tried to help them boost production yeilds at those 2 sites.
The reason I assume why uk had invested 21 million in halix at the Netherlands and sent people was that site was meant to be part of UK supply chain or why would they do it?
Why did it take so long ema and eu approve the Netherlands site?
So anything that was produced in leiden could not be used in Europe for least jan to march.
Apparently some articles said wasent worth authorising as they were not producing much but as soon as they realised halix were productive they seized everything the factory produced solely for the block and they rejected uk offer to share the vaccines supply there.
Thetes also matter of Dutch refusing add extra investment to Oxford as as they warned they would have yeild issues last year so the Dutch must have known there was issue.
So has az made best reasonable efforts to fix and increase production at the 2 eu sites that are part of EU supply chain.

Also demand I don't know how many eu member states have banned az is it just Denmark? Don't think Switzerland ever authorised but they not the EU.
Many have age restricted it to older people.
Presumably I don't know as that's another issue is eu commission was in charge vaccine procurement hut had no say on order the vaccines were given and many members states chose go against ema advice and also some brought from Russia and china.
If the majority elderly within the eu had their vaccines .
Eu already said they don't wish to have 100 million extra doses.
Understnd how those with 1st jab az want 2nd and can't believe they dident hold back 2nd dose supply .
Think France made some cutting remarks about how we recklessly ploughed ahead with 1st doses and for a while 1st quarter 2021 2nd doses and pfizer supply issue did feel like a real worry in the UK with eu making export bans and threats left right and centre.
We know our local confidence in az in some member states is shattered.
We know that eu for some reason has way more Moderna than us and got it 1st.
We know they have janson rolling out.
So thye have 4 vaccines approved abd supplied so whats the actual demand d for az doses how much do they really need?
Is there anywhere online that tells us how much each member state is holding anymore?
None of them have stockpiles as thought Germany did.

eu for some reason has way more Moderna than us and got it 1st
Same reason as the reverse for AZ. They placed a larger order and they placed it sooner. Both UK and EU placed a few Moderna orders, but UK initial one was tiny.

This article says we sent vaccines task force to Netherlands and we invested 21 million because halix was part of UK supply chain.
Eu said they not allowing anything sent there from uk.
I think udlv admitted herself in 1 press conference that eu sent 21 million vaccines to the UK.
20million were pfizer so only 1million az were sent to UK.
The halix plant productivity is 5 to 6 million.

www.politico.eu/article/breton-no-astrazeneca-jabs-exported-from-netherlands-after-eu-export-controls/

www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1417865/EU-vaccine-news-UK-investment-AstraZeneca-Halix-Netherlands-blockade-latest

Because of this export ban I think this is why uk were forced do a deal with serum institute in India for 10million but we only received 5.

The eu also approached serum institute for extra az doses.
I think India was meant to supply India, surrounding countries and covax never the uk or EU.

@3asAbird the reuters article I linked to on the previous page rather confirms that hte total Az the UK received from manufacturing sites in the EU was only one million doses.

"Jafferali said that principle had not been respected because the drugmaker had not delivered to the bloc 50 million doses produced in factories that are listed in the contract as suppliers to the EU, including 39 million doses manufactured in Britain, 10 million produced in the United States and 1 million in the Netherlands."

[quote Motorina]@3asAbird the reuters article I linked to on the previous page rather confirms that hte total Az the UK received from manufacturing sites in the EU was only one million doses.

"Jafferali said that principle had not been respected because the drugmaker had not delivered to the bloc 50 million doses produced in factories that are listed in the contract as suppliers to the EU, including 39 million doses manufactured in Britain, 10 million produced in the United States and 1 million in the Netherlands."[/quote]
I just don't see how a measles 1million to uk in total sent from az eu sites was seen to be favouring the UK.
If we only produced 39million so far at the 2 UK sites theres no way we could fulfill thier order let alone vaccinate our own country.
I wonder how Belgian courts are looking at this.
I also wonder i understand UK doesn't want to get involved or upset eu or they might not get any pfizer is why we haven't sent eu or Netherlands a 21million pound invoice

Or why we not seeking legal action its a lot of money.

The serum institute deal predates oxfords deal with AZ. It got rewritten, post the AZ deal I think.

In relation to the AZ application for approval of the Halix site in Leiden, the EMA approved it on 23/03.

I read an article from 12th March that the application was incomplete and that the EMA were waiting on this to be provided.

If we can compare the date the application was made, necessary information which was missing or issues which cropped up, then we can compare it with other similar applications?

Otherwise, it is just groundless accusatory blather.

Interesting article

www.euractiv.com/section/economy-jobs/interview/breton-europe-was-too-naive-before-now-we-are-in-the-driving-seat/

I watch John cambell on you tube covid updates and he said next year uk will be producing 700million vaccines a year
And 3 new vaccines factories coming online.
If we vaccinated everyone by summer and say Europe autumn are the vaccines produced boosters or annual shots like flu so every country will require yearly covid shots?

amp.rte.ie/amp/1217846/.
Az contract due end in June which starts next week and not to be renewed.
I assume az don't have any new booster 2nd gen vaccines in the pipe line hence why eu doesn't mind parting on bad terms

All their eggs seem be in 1 expensive pfizer basket.
Will Sanofi and curevac be 2nd gen vaccines.

Also seems usa is causing EU more issues than UK as Curevac is nearly ready but needs raw component from the usa.

www.reuters.com/world/us/eu-persuades-us-ease-covid-export-restrictions-curevac-sources-2021-05-21/

The vaccine task force leader of eu loves to be aggressive and competitive

ec.europa.eu/commission/commissioners/2019-2024/breton/announcements/beating-covid-19-scale-vaccine-production-europe_en

The EMA are considering approving Russian and Chinese vaccines.
The eu failed reach agreement with novavax or valneva but each individual member state is free strike up thier own deals..
They have no real need for az anymore other than 2nd doses surely.

All the vaccine producers initially suffered delays that comes with the territory of vaccine production and blockages on component and equipment has not helped matters.

I think it is important to state that no application for approval for either Sinovac or Sputnik V has been submitted to the EMA; before people start accusing them of not rushing approval through quickly enough.

A rolling review of Sinovac, CureVac, Novavax and Sputnik V data is being carried out by the EMA. This is to allow a rapid evaluation process for promising Covid 19 vaccines which may subsequently apply for 'conditional marketing authorisation'. Unlike the 'emergency use' authorisation nation states can give, the EMA's is more stringent, requires more data and is an actual marketing authorisation.

When, and if, the Human Medicines Committee deems there is sufficient data, then the manufacturer can submit an application for conditional marketing approval.

@Baileysforchristmas

Does anyone really think it’s reasonable for the EU to take all the vaccines from the UK when the UK funded most of the development, trials and setting up the UK sites? Especially when the UK was hit hardest by the pandemic and had the largest number of deaths in Europe?

The UK has hardly any infections or deaths now, unlike the EU, which is still seeing deaths and infections... so i would support us supplying EU countries (or any country for that matter) to ensure key staff get their full vaccination.

I don't really see why anyone would object to that.

I think i have already provided links (on another thread) to show that Oxford uni was heavily funded by the EU pre CV, which Oxf say enabled them to hit the ground running with CV, so the EU were indeed key to the AZ vaccine.

The uk currently has got the Indian variant at a higher level than other European countries. The protection is obtained post having both vaccines , so uk can be in a good situation. Now but if people don’t get their vaccines there might be higher numbers and deaths next month. So I don’t think it’s wise at the moment to send the vaccines whilst this variant is taking up. And I say this as a European person whose parents have had their first of az and they don’t know whether they’ll have their second

@RafaIsTheKingOfClay

The serum institute deal predates oxfords deal with AZ. It got rewritten, post the AZ deal I think.

Sorry, I had to get off the bus, and didn’t have time to explain.

Right back at the start, Oxford’s initial plan was to offer the vaccine to as many manufacturers that wanted to produce it. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation apparently convinced them this was a bad idea and they should stick to one manufacturer. Oxford had already signed a contract with the Serum institute by this point. Eventually after some (sensible) interference from the DoH they went with AZ, but there was still a contract with the serum institute.
The serum institue were supposed to be producing the Oxford vaccine for the less economically developed countries, with the benefit to India that they get 50% of the vaccines produced rather than the 35% they would have got per head of population. AZ would then be producing it for the richer countries from it’s factories. And somehow they seem to have got themselves into a complete mess over this, leaving them trying to meet the orders they promised to everywhere except the U.K. and US from the European factories.

Hopefully how they got into this mess might be made clearer during the court cases. At the very least, it does seem to have been a bit naive of them to assume that they could serve a legal notice on Serum Institute for non delivery but not think that others might then do the same for them.

@EasterIssland

The uk currently has got the Indian variant at a higher level than other European countries. The protection is obtained post having both vaccines , so uk can be in a good situation. Now but if people don’t get their vaccines there might be higher numbers and deaths next month. So I don’t think it’s wise at the moment to send the vaccines whilst this variant is taking up. And I say this as a European person whose parents have had their first of az and they don’t know whether they’ll have their second

Well, perhaps a better question is why has the UK such a high Indian variant in circulation?

Looking ahead, AZ (on current data) is 60% Pfizer 86%, UK is using Pfizer for its booster program.

The main vaccine producing countries in normal times would be India (major part of plan), USA (introduced export ban during that timeline but had been set up for Americas), China (not suitable), Germany & Belgium (Germany involved with BioNTech, Belgium major plank of plan), Brazil... The locations chosen weren't necessarily unreasonable though Brazil could have been included. Australia and South Korea have also been set up.

The locations weren't the issue so much as getting the process underway and sourcing all raw materials. It's fairly simple to see that the AZ vaccine scale-up was harder than anticipated in all locations, with delays everywhere. A key criticism might be that it was somewhat underfunded; the issue there was complexity but also cost price, perhaps to the point of penny-pinching. More facilities set up earlier would have been wasting vaccines and money to get to grips with the process, but that would have led to doses being delivered sooner.

@jasjas1973 - the UK has a very much larger Indian population due to shared language and the Commonwealth. The UK had more flights from India; not just families but business too, there are a lot of IT industry links in particular. Covid seeded in the UK from Spain last February/March and in the summer with a new variant too.

Sometimes it's really just as simple as number of travellers

The additional genome testing in the UK helps to highlight more cases too.