[ad_1]
Germany purchased 30 million supplemental doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, following a bilateral agreement with the company. This was confirmed yesterday by a spokesman for the Ministry of Health, after the news was revealed by the newspaper. image (According to which there would also be a similar agreement for about 50 million doses with the American company Moderna). Thus, Berlin is failing a European solidarity agreement close between the ministers of health of the member countries, who designated the European Commission as the sole buyer.
The German government has also entered into agreements with BioNTech to increase vaccine production on German soil, at a former Novartis plant in Marburg, Hesse, which will be converted by BioNTech to produce more doses starting in February. We will not do vaccine nationalismHe was promised by the Minister of Health, Jens Spahn. The fact that the first approved at EU level comes from a German pharmaceutical company (BioNTech is based in Mainz, ed) do not give us advantages. But among their counterparts in Europe the news tastes like breaking lines.
European cooperation for the purchase of vaccines was a good page. We trust that it should not be interrupted. So yesterday at Tg1 the extraordinary commissioner for the emergency Covid Domenico Arcuri. Italy, he recalled, together with France, Germany and the Netherlands has promoted European centralized purchasing. The Union purchases for all members and distributes the doses according to the population. We have 13.5% of the vaccines. A clarification that seems to reflect the irritation of Palazzo Chigi by the German initiative.
The Europe Agreement
The whole operation seemed defined in detail and was to become a European demonstration of how unity is strength. Since early summer, the governments of the 27 had agreed that the Commission would be the one to negotiate and conclude all the purchase of the vaccines promised by the six pharmaceutical groups with the most promising developments: Pfizer-BioNtech (a German-American initiative), the American Moderna, the Anglo-Swedish group Astra-Zeneca, the French Sanofi with Gsk, the German Curevac and the other American Johnson & Johnson. In total 1.95 billion doses: 200 million from Pfizer (and another 100 optional later); 160 from Moderna; 400 from AstraZeneca, 300 from Sanofi, 400 from Johnson and 405 from CureVac.
The agreement with the Commission was that the latter would acquire and distribute the doses in proportion to the population of each country.. No one should have moved alone. In December an integration: the first vaccinations would be carried out on December 27, with 9,750 doses of Pfizer-BioNtech available symbolically for each country (even if Germany then had 9,750 for each of its 16 Lnder: 156,000).
This approach reflects the practical need of Europeans to appear in the global markets for vaccines against Covid-19 with colossal orders, nearly two billion doses in total, thus becoming a priority as the industry tried to produce the drugs in forced stages. But it also reflected a less confessable political dilemma: If each government had acted alone, the pharmaceutical companies would have ended up favoring the politically stronger countries, those that can pay first and where the manufacturers are based. The others would come later. The right to health of a German, French or Swedish citizen would have been more equal than that of a Bulgarian or Greek.
The phrase
Of the vaccine doses already chosen by the Commission, to only a part is already sure that it will be delivered: Out of a total of 2 billion doses from 6 pharmaceutical companies, only 300 million from the BioNTech-Pfizer version and 80 million (with an option for another 80) from Moderna, not yet authorized by the EMA, are already approved and delivered. Vaccination plans in all European countries are highly dependent on manufacturers whose vaccine has not yet been approved, or whose unfinished experimentation. When the French Sanofi announced in early December that the development of its product was delayed – around 20% of the optional doses – the system went into entropy.
In summer, in the meetings of the delegates of the ministries of health of the 27, according to several participants French representatives insisted that Sanofi’s market share in the Covid-19 vaccine be safeguarded As a result, orders for the vaccine from the US company Pfizer were limited. Thus, the latter now covers only 13.3% of European supplies. Sanofi may have to wait until September 2021 for approval, and AstraZeneca dosages so far have only been tested in people up to 55 years of age. Not in the elderly: we would have to wait months to be able to extend the administration of the Anglo-Swedish product to everyone and this time it is not there.
The German government’s decision to break the lines of European solidarity starts from here. But it is not clear where it leads, because it could unleash a nationalist race to monopolize everyone against everyone. Now the EU Commission has asked Pfizer to double its supplies; however, delivery times remain highly uncertain.
December 29, 2020 (change December 29, 2020 | 09:47)
© REPRODUCTION RESERVED
[ad_2]
