EU Contract With AstraZeneca

The thing is, we don't yet know.

Vaccinations are taking place. But we don't yet know if the strategy of leaving such a big gap between doses is a good one. And we don't know what issues will come from the vaccine, what knock on effects it will have, what long term issues continued treatment will have and so on.

At this moment in time, given all of the huge screw ups at excessive cost to everyone other than tory donors, it's not yet proven they've made a pigs ear of this.

My biggest issue. This government took a massive gamble on vaccines. I don't think governments should do that.

 

Exactly. The people of the EU are the ones who will suffer ultimately and the EU will have to be held accountable for failing their own people.

 

"It's worked out well enough, so difficult to criticise."

The EU includes the UK under paragraph 5.4 of the contract.

 

Die Welt is reporting that the contract published by the EU has redacted the section concerning delivery schedules in the first quarter.

 

I agree the 12 weeks between doses has its risks (only applies to the Pfizer vaccine though as AZ are confident with that approach?). it may also prove to be a master stroke. We don't know.

And regarding issues from the vaccine(s), well all countries are using the pretty much the same ones, so every nation's government is exposed to and complicit in those same risks, whether they approved a vaccine in December, January or February. Every government has taken a risk regarding the long term effects of the vaccines available.

 

"difficult".

 

Seeing as its redacted, it's a bit difficult to know for sure.

Is it true that Die Welt is considered a conservative publication and is it still in the European Dailies Alliance which includes the Daily Telegraph?

 

That's fair. There's so much we don't know and it concerns me that decisions are being made for political expediency and whim which goes against medical fact or where studies have inconclusive, or insufficient data. And why I find the medias rampant attacks on the EU over this really distasteful.

Obviously that takes time and volumes of people. But we've certainly had a maverick approach and one I'm just not comfortable with, even if it turns out to be ok in the long run for the sake of a few weeks. It's likely we're all going to be getting these vaccines for the rest of our lives.

I read yesterday that £800m has been spent on operation moonshot. The lateral flow tests that are only 60% accurate and didn't identify heavy viral loads in 30% of cases.

 

You might add in the gazillions spent on test and trace, which has proved fairly useless. But let's face it, if their gamble was going to pay off then vaccines is the one you'd have wanted them to score on. That's what's going to resolve this issue this time around. But it will need to be resolved globally, so I totally agree about the media ******** being distasteful.

 

I guessed theres a word count limit on here, so I decided on brevity of DePfeffels balls ups. I could have still been typing by the time we rejoined the EU! ;-)

 

Altruistic government doesn't exist. Not here in the UK anymore than it does in the EU or the US. I agree that politics are driving decisions on a federal level, but they always do regardless of the subject.

What's being lost here, is that this is a dispute between a private company and the EU. Not the UK government. My point is that it was the EU's resonsibility to safeguard their people with a robust vaccination program. They have failed to do that so far.

What worries me more than anything, is there is still a cognitive dissonance to what's really behind the rise in zoonotic viruses and until we start treating the planet and the animal kingdom with the respect it deserves we will remain forever under threat as a species.

 

I certainly agree with you on the last point. Habitat destruction and loss of biodiversity is continuing at pace and mankind seems incapable of adapting or finding equilibrium.

Nature will ultimately win, even of we wipe out much of it in the process.

 

EU naughty naughty.

 

Sadly, the EU’s true colours are shining through.

 

Where have you seen the contract? It is redacted in any case. The only bit of an extract BBC showed actually (Para 5.4) pointed out the manufacture in EU/UK would be " bets reasonable effort". As you say you are not a lawyer but clearly have superpowers to determine the contract (which you have not read) agrees with the EUs stance!

 

It does say in 5.4 that UK for the purposes of 5.4 is included in EU. However, It also states in 5.4 "best reasonable effort" Surely that is standard 'get out of jail' card in contracts that means they are not committing to any specifics. That said, since none of us have seen the full unredacted contract there may be more detail in the redacted sections surrounding guarantees for delivery times amounts etc. The fact that these HAVE been redacted in the public release document, I suspect the French CEO of AZ has a better grasp of the real facts than van Leyen who is basically trying to deflect from the Sh*t storm coming at the EU commission from member states.

Did the Company agree to the release of document by the EU which had confidentiality clauses. If so are the EU not in breach. In any case, other than trying to get public opinion on their side what is the benefit of releasing parts of it for public consumption? It is difficult to defend the EU actions over this and it really does appear to be connected to Brexit ( why have they and the German Health minister referenced UK Govt when a) the dispute is between EU and private company and b) the private company in question is not solely UK owned as Sweden is also involved and they have not even been cited by the EU.
It will be interesting in the coming weeks to see which countries are approved when it comes to Pfizer exports from the EU especially if the, at the same time block them to the UK.

 

She wanted brexit, din't she?

 

Do you condone the EU’s actions?

 

They are acting in line with the terms of the agreement we concluded with them, so what's the problem?

 

So, yes.