EU feels entitled (!) to UK vaccination supplies

Unbelievable spite and pettiness revealed in this Graun story  Hypocrisy and cynicism as well, while I am here -- a Eurocrat talking about moral duty! The usual double-dealing about what sort of contract they insist they signed as well. No doubt the ECJ will decide.

 

Belgian regulators have launched an investigation into AstraZeneca’s coronavirus vaccine production site near Brussels on the request of the European commission, in an escalation of the row over shortages within the EU.

The Anglo-Swedish company has said it will be able to deliver to EU member states only about 25% of the 100m doses expected by the end of March due to a production problem at the Belgian site owned by the French life-sciences company Novasep. The vaccine is expected to be authorised by the European medicines agency on Friday....At the same time, AstraZeneca has assured Downing Street that it will be able to produce 2m doses a week of the vaccine to the UK in order to successfully fulfil a total order of 100m jabs. The vaccine was authorised by the UK regulator in December.

The backdrop to the investigation is AstraZeneca’s insistence that it will not make up the shortfall in deliveries to the EU by diverting vaccine doses made in Oxford and Staffordshire and put into vials in Wrexham....“The UK agreement was reached in June, three months before the European one,” he said in an interview on Monday. “As you could imagine, the UK government said the supply coming out of the UK supply chain would go for the UK first. Basically that’s how it is.”

“We reject the logic of first come, first served,” the [EU] commissioner said. “That may work in a butcher’s shop but not in contracts [with we lofty creatures] and not in our advanced purchase agreements.” [and]...AstraZeneca had a moral as well as contractual duty to treat the EU similarly to the UK....She said: “We are in a pandemic. We lose people every day. These are not numbers, they’re not statistics. These are persons with families with friends and colleagues that are all affected as well....“Pharmaceutical companies, vaccine developers have moral, societal and contractual responsibilities, which they need to uphold. The view that the company is not obliged to deliver because we signed a best effort agreement is neither correct, nor is it acceptable.”