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Original title: EU vaccines: safety concerns continue to ferment uneven distribution and many countries are dissatisfied
[Conexión con reportero]
In recent days, people in some EU countries have experienced several cases of brain thrombosis or bleeding after receiving AstraZeneca’s new corona vaccine approved by the European Medicines Agency. This has increased people’s concern about the safety of the vaccine and has forced many EU countries to announce a moratorium on the use of the AstraZeneca Vaccine vaccine.
This vaccine, developed jointly by the British-Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, has received more than 11 million doses in the United Kingdom, although data from the United Kingdom show that the number of cases of blood clots after vaccination is no more natural than in the vaccinated population. There are many cases of thrombosis, but many European countries have discontinued the use of the vaccine. After the German Ministry of Health announced the suspension of vaccination against AstraZeneca on March 15, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal and Slovenia followed up later that day, while Sweden, Luxembourg and Latvia followed up on March 16. Other countries that have suspended vaccination are the Netherlands, Ireland, Denmark, Norway, Iceland and Bulgaria.
Safety concerns affect Europe’s vaccine supply
In view of the continuing fermentation of AstraZeneca vaccine safety concerns in the EU, the European Medicines Agency urgently summoned experts to investigate the vaccine. On the afternoon of March 18 local time, the director of the European Medicines Agency, Emer Cook, issued a statement in Amsterdam, saying that there is insufficient evidence to show that there is an inevitable connection between the AstraZeneca vaccine and thrombosis. . The AstraZeneca vaccine is safe and effective. , The benefits of vaccination far outweigh the side effects. Cook also called on EU member states that had previously discontinued the AstraZeneca vaccine to continue using it, “this is vital to saving lives.” Coincidentally, the WHO issued a statement on March 17 stating that the WHO Global Advisory Committee on Vaccine Safety is conducting a cautious assessment of the latest relevant information. Currently, WHO believes that the benefits of the AstraZeneca vaccine outweigh the risks and it is recommended to Continue Vaccination Plan.
The suspension of AstraZeneca vaccines in many countries has worsened the EU’s vaccine supply situation, already stretched. In Austria, where vaccination against AstraZeneca has not been suspended, some people in the medical community revealed that if the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine is suspended for two weeks, the vaccination rate in Austria will return to the state of January, which will seriously affect to vaccination. plan. Take Vienna for example: of the 100,000 doses to be vaccinated in the next two weeks, 45,000 are AstraZeneca vaccines, almost half. According to the vaccination plan previously formulated by the European Union, 70% of the adult population of the EU should be vaccinated in September of this year, and by then the target of herd immunity will be reached. However, according to the current speed of vaccine supply, it will take 16 months to achieve this goal at the highest speed, and the plan will not be completed in 2021. At present, on the one hand, the EU is pinning its hopes on the other approved vaccines, namely Pfizer, Modena and Johnson & Johnson, in hopes of alleviating the situation by increasing the supply of these vaccines; on the other hand, it is also trying to get more vaccines, especially those member states whose EU vaccine allocation cannot cover their domestic needs, such as Hungary, which has previously bought vaccines from China and Russia.
Consensus and self-government in the allocation of vaccines
Faced with the current dilemma of vaccines, European public opinion is very concerned about the issue, when will Europeans be able to use vaccines from other countries such as China and Russia? To answer this question, we must start with the EU vaccine distribution mechanism.
Currently, vaccine distribution in the European Union follows the consensus principle. A distribution group is made up of representatives from 27 member states to jointly determine the total amount of each vaccine. Once the total amount of orders has been initially determined, the representatives of each country have 5 days to inform their governments and peoples After requesting opinions, the final purchase amount will be decided after 5 days, and the vaccine will be distributed in proportion to the population of each member country after the purchase of the vaccine. Usually the actual EU purchase volume will be slightly more than the purchase volume decided by each country to prepare for the unexpected needs of each country. The original intention of this distribution model is to ensure equity as much as possible to avoid oversupply caused by countries with strong financial resources that can buy vaccines in large quantities, while relatively poor countries have insufficient supply. But on the other hand, this approach has also caused a problem: what vaccines member states can get and how much to get are largely determined by the European Union, limiting the autonomy of member states to buy vaccines.
In practice, because the European Union purchases of vaccines cannot meet the needs of the member states in a short time, each member state inevitably has an “autonomous” situation, that is, it buys separately vaccines that have not been approved by the European Union. Vaccines between Russia and Russia. In response to this situation, EU Health Commissioner Kyria Gides said that although the EU does not encourage such behavior, it has no right to interfere.
The European Union has the following views on the “Hungarian model”. First, the vaccines from China and Russia have not yet been approved by the European Medicines Agency. Once a potential security hazard arises, member states must assume the relevant responsibilities themselves. Second, the current EU vaccine distribution model is that the EU signs vaccine purchase contracts with pharmaceutical companies and then distributes uniformly among member states; If a member country and pharmaceutical companies reach a bilateral agreement, the member country must withdraw from the EU and the company’s vaccine distribution plan. This means that if the European Union buys Chinese vaccines uniformly in the future, member states like Hungary that have bought Chinese vaccines in advance will not be able to get the Chinese vaccines assigned by the European Union again. The third is that the EU recommends that member states not follow Hungary’s separate procurement of vaccines from the European Union. Due to the different economic strengths of each member state, it will be difficult to guarantee fair results for all countries, and it can lead to further confusion and division within the EU. This is a situation that the EU wants to avoid.
Vaccines are assigned as a new gap in the EU
However, the reality is that the current EU vaccine distribution model has led to uneven distribution and discontent among member states. Currently, the EU member state with the highest amount of vaccine distribution per capita is Malta, with 23.9 doses per 100 people, which is 155% above the scheduled distribution; while Bulgaria, which has the lowest distribution, has a distribution of 4.4 doses. For every 100 people, which is less than the programmed distribution of 59%, the disparity in the distribution of the different member states is evident.
In response to this situation, on March 13, the leaders of Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Latvia sent a letter to the leaders of the European Commission and the European Council, stating in the letter that the supply of vaccines by companies pharmaceutical companies to EU member states is not on an equal footing. The previous implementation did not follow the principle of equitable distribution in proportion to the population. On March 16, Austrian Chancellor Kurz and the Prime Ministers of Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Slovenia met in Vienna to discuss the issue, in which the leaders of Croatia and Latvia participated via video. Kurtz told a press conference after the meeting that the European Union had promised member states to obtain the corresponding vaccine quotas at the same time, but the current situation is not like that. The current uneven distribution will generate tensions within the EU. Only by establishing a “correction mechanism” will it be possible to compensate for the imbalance in vaccination coverage between countries, not to avoid responsibilities, but to solve the problem. Although Kurtz did not disclose the details of the “amendment mechanism”, he said that the leaders of the European Commission and the European Council are working hard to this end.
It is not easy for the EU to solve this dilemma in a short period of time to achieve a fair distribution and ensure an adequate supply of vaccines.
(Our newspaper, Vienna, March 19, report from our Vienna correspondent Jiao Shousong)
