[HN Gopher] EU vaccine rollout severely lags behind
___________________________________________________________________
EU vaccine rollout severely lags behind
Author : undefined1
Score : 149 points
Date : 2021-03-22 16:44 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.statista.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.statista.com)
| jariel wrote:
| Here are national breakdowns:
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations
| Aardwolf wrote:
| I wish this website would allow having a link to an individual
| country, every time you refresh you have to deselect all
| default countries again and add the country you're interested
| in again
| _Microft wrote:
| You can link to a graph with a particular selection of
| countries directly. There is a symbol with connected dots in
| the bottom right corner of the graph that allows to copy a
| link to it as it is shown.
|
| Example:
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-
| explor...
| config_yml wrote:
| In Switzerland it's the same. In my state/canton they don't even
| have enough vaccine for the high risk group of 240k people.
| garbaty_ciul wrote:
| This is exceptionally sad due to the country being 1) rich 2)
| with small population (comparable to Israel) 3) big in pharma
| industry
|
| Yet from what i see the public discourse is most concerned
| about opening up restaurant terraces, etc. and not the immense
| economical damage that having late vaccination campaign will
| inflict.
| [deleted]
| nairboon wrote:
| What can you expect from an exceptionally incompetent
| government. Today the Johnson vaccine was approved by the
| Swiss "FDA", but the government actually forgot to this day
| to order any doses of that vaccine... Instead they ordered
| Novavax & Curevac which didn't even apply for approval in
| Switzerland.
| groos wrote:
| People have friends but nations have interests. Looks like the EU
| is rediscovering this the hard way.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| My partner, who is 32 with only minor underlying health issues,
| received her first jab yesterday. I'm obviously pleased that she
| will shortly have some degree of protection both for her sake and
| for our daughter and I, since my partner is the only one who has
| to leave the house for work.
|
| However, at the same time, I can't help feel that we've jumped
| the queue slightly. The EU is experiencing another wave which
| will doubtlessly culminate in thousands of deaths, the majority
| will be from people older or with much more serious health
| complications than my partner.
|
| I'm kinda sick of reading these debates about who ordered what
| and when under what conditions. There is a complete lack of
| compassion, we should be doing what we can to help those
| countries who still have older people unvaccinated. We can wait
| another couple of months before our holidays to Blackpool and
| Stalyvegas.
| joelbluminator wrote:
| So why help the EU - why should they jump the queue before
| Africa or India or China?
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| I'm not sure what part of what I said you've misread as only
| helping the EU. For the avoidance of doubt, I think we should
| act with compassion, trying to save lives regardless of the
| place those people were born in.
| breakfastduck wrote:
| I agree with that, but the UK was one of the first
| countries to stump up cash and start developing a vaccine
| before it'd even got bad in the UK.
|
| That's basically the reason, it was part of the contract
| that we get first dibs if fund it.
|
| I don't think EU countries putting out bad press about the
| AstraZenica vaccine is doing them any favors either - it's
| the company they're in negotiations with!
|
| Not saying what's fair or isn't here but that's the
| reality.
| secondcoming wrote:
| > We can wait another couple of months before our holidays to
| Blackpool and Stalyvegas
|
| Speak for yourself. I'm not being glib. Compassion is wearing
| thin. There are anti-lockdown protests all over the UK and EU.
| There is a limit to how much more the ordinary citizen can
| endure. If that means that some people have to risk death then
| perhaps, as awful as it sounds, that may be for the best.
| They're the ones who should stay at home.
|
| And yes, I do have elderly relatives who are at risk.
| donovanian wrote:
| Yea I'm frankly tired of hearing from the authoritarian
| agoraphobes. The ones that air their resentment of returning
| to "normal life." Dumb stuff like getting dressed or not
| working from bed.
| astrange wrote:
| Everyone who gets vaccinated is contributing, because you're
| all preventing the spread. Once it's not spreading, then it
| might be OK to hold off on shots so that the elderly can get
| them, but for now as many people should get it as possible.
|
| The US, despite actually doing very well at vaccine
| distribution, should probably have switched to the one shot for
| everyone model.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| This is a fair point. I'm also sick of hearing about unions
| complaining about this occupation not being vaccinated or
| this group with this health condition not being vaccinated
| first. If we expended all of the energy to somehow rate all
| of these competing factors we'd never be done.
| Graffur wrote:
| The EU has been beyond useless during the whole covid-19
| pandemic. I find it pretty disappointing since with quicker
| action and common rules we could be in a much better place right
| now.
|
| I think it is silly that EU citizens are dying and/or locked down
| because of money and/or contracts.
| vrepsys wrote:
| The EU has failed to secure contracts ensuring the EU produced
| vaccine stays in the EU[1].
|
| So far the EU has exported 41.6 million doses of the vaccine (the
| largest importer being the UK)[2]. Both the US and the UK have
| exported 0 vaccines.
|
| [1] https://twitter.com/davekeating/status/1372897635577761803
|
| [2]
| https://twitter.com/AlexTaylorNews/status/137362147260701081...
| DrBazza wrote:
| The EU doesn't export anything, it's AZ and Pfizer that are
| exporting, as per their contracts with the UK and other
| countries. It is up to AZ and Pfizer to decide how to use their
| factories to meet their contractual obligations with the UK and
| the EU.
|
| The UK (companies) on the other hand are exporting vaccine
| components (fatty lipids) that enable those factories to
| produce vaccines for not only the UK, but the EU, and
| Australia, if it ever receives its doses.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| Why are people so defensive of any criticism of EU? There are
| a lot of good things that come out of EU, their vaccine
| program is a complete shitshow. Europeans should observe that
| and shed light on it.
|
| The social media is full to the brim with "EU exported
| because they're nice guys" including the top comment on HN.
| DrBazza wrote:
| > Why are people so defensive of any criticism of EU?
|
| Or any opinion these days? Social media. The mute button,
| echo chambers, confirmation bias, lack of critical thought,
| and so on?
|
| I think the events of the last few years will keep
| psychologists in business for decades.
|
| A Douglas Adams quote feels apt:
|
| "So long as you can keep disagreeing with each other
| violently enough and slagging each other off in the popular
| press, you can keep yourself on the gravy train for life. "
| the_mitsuhiko wrote:
| You can be both critical of the EU vaccine rollout and
| still find it unacceptable that the other countries are not
| exporting but the EU is supposed to.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| It seems like people are _violently_ defensive in this
| thread. I flagged it because we are not getting down to
| the facts.
|
| There are convoluted aspects of who manufactures it,
| where it is manufactured, what countries govern those
| companies, trade laws and agreements, what the contract
| was, what were the policies, what export/imports took
| place, and what is planned.
|
| People are talking past each other.
| breakfastduck wrote:
| The EU don't own the vaccines, it's so much more
| complicated than that.
| Veen wrote:
| > other countries are not exporting but the EU is
| supposed to.
|
| People keep saying this, but the EU is not exporting.
| Companies with facilities in the EU are exporting. Those
| vaccines don't belong to the EU; they belong to whoever
| bought them. If the EU prevented their export,it doesn't
| mean they own more vaccines, unless the plan is to steal
| the property of other countries and companies.
| vrepsys wrote:
| The UK has partially funded AZ and added a clause into the
| contract that will prioritise UK for future vaccine exports
| from the UK. And that's exactly what's happening, all AZ
| produced in UK stays in UK)
|
| Whereas a similar contract between Germany and Biontech
| (Germany paid biontech $445 million to help develop the
| vaccine) didn't include a clause defining export priorities.
| Pfizer-Biontech is exported all over the world.
|
| Canada, for example, gets their Pfizer-Biontech from the EU,
| instead of Michigan where they're also produced.
| dundarious wrote:
| AFAIK you are correct except perhaps that US and UK have
| exported 0 vaccines, though the number is probably quite small
| relatively speaking, and certainly smaller than the EU
| (foolishly) expected.
| FranzFerdiNaN wrote:
| This os the EU being a good ally. The expectation was that the
| UK and US would also help by exporting part of their
| production, which was indeed dumb.
|
| The US also didnt secure such contracts, they simply forbid any
| export. The UK is helped by AZ not sending anything produced in
| the UK to the EU, despite the EU contract stipulating that
| doses would also come from the UK.
| onetimemanytime wrote:
| >> _The US also didnt secure such contracts, they simply
| forbid any export._
|
| USA bought vaccines from everyone a year ago and opened the
| check book, giving them billions without knowing if the
| vaccine will work. And then put all their weight to help them
| find factories and stuff. So USA gambled relatively nothing
| (Covid has cost many trillions) and gained a lot.
|
| EU doing what they do best...meetings. USA bans exports in
| this sense: if Pfizer agreed to give USA 50 million shots in
| March, no exports until that number is delivered. Seems fair.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| Pfizer wasn't part of Operation Warp Speed, they refused to
| join because they figured the bureaucracy would slow them
| down.
|
| They did take some money from Germany though, because it
| came without strings.
|
| Is it a coincidence that they were the first vaccine
| approved?
|
| So to be fair it should be Germany getting all those Pfizer
| shots rather than the US.
| onetimemanytime wrote:
| But USA signed a purchase agreement to buy the vaccines
| way before EU did. Pfizer is obligated to deliver them
| first. Warp speed was just to get it going, USA would
| cover any loses.
|
| Can we agree that $20 or even $50 Billion is NOTHING to
| USA or EU at this point...each month in delays costs
| more. USA realized that a year ago and blocked doses from
| all, including 100 million Pfizer doses in July 2020.
| https://investors.pfizer.com/investor-news/press-release-
| det...
| foepys wrote:
| You cannot compare this just by contracts. The US is
| blocking all exports of COVID-19 vaccines (except for AZ
| to Mexico and Canada just now). Pfizer/Biontech were
| until just a few weeks ago only producing in one location
| inside the EU so they were bottlenecked in fulfilling EU
| demand. Meanwhile the EU doesn't block exports.
|
| The EU did a bad job but we have to keep the facts
| straight.
| makomk wrote:
| No, the expectation was that the EU vaccine demand would be
| supplied by EU factories. The UK doesn't even have final
| manufacturing for any vaccines other than the AstraZeneca one
| - for the most part, our government has taken a policy of
| funding and signing contracts with the same factories
| supplying the EU and assuming they wouldn't pull some export
| ban stunt to distract from their own problems. (This was
| probably naive.) And as for the AstraZeneca vaccine, the
| expectation that the contracted-for doses would come from
| their EU factories is literally written into their contract
| with the EU...
| yyyk wrote:
| Lipids for the Pfizer vaccine are manufactured in the UK. A
| total EU export ban would have elicited a response nobody
| would have liked.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Not just that; quite a lot of EU AZ production goes to the
| UK, too.
| koyote wrote:
| Do you have a source on that? I was under impression that
| the UK manufactures their entire AZ stock and the only
| vaccine produced in the EU for the UK is Pfizer/BioNTech
| kuschku wrote:
| 70% of the doses the EU bought were instead delivered to
| the UK to fulfill AZ's obligation to the UK.
|
| After that initial batch, a further 8 million EU doses
| were exported to the UK, and a further 46 million EU
| doses were exported to other countries, including the US.
|
| Just this second batch would have tripled the EU's
| vaccination rate so far.
| dependsontheq wrote:
| Well it's all just hindsight - depending on which vaccines are
| approved first different countries would have one this race. The
| EU is a bit of a nicer player internationally in general because
| the only thing holding it together are the common market rules so
| it is very rules focused.
|
| I think talking about winning or failed vaccination campaigns
| might be a bit early.
| dang wrote:
| Recent and related:
|
| _Europe 's Vaccine Disaster_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25964197 - Jan 2021 (418
| comments)
|
| I think there have been other threads as well?
| bayareabadboy wrote:
| Is Britain doing better than EU? I know nothing but that seems
| like an easy comparison, right?
| tinus_hn wrote:
| Britain is almost halfway done vaccinating all of the adult
| population. It's not in the same league as the EU.
| celticninja wrote:
| almost 50% have had the first dose, is different to halfway
| done vaccinating the adult population. As I understand the
| figures, only 2 million have had the second dose.
| Robotbeat wrote:
| The difference in benefit between one and two doses is
| pretty small in absolute terms. Props to the UK for
| prioritizing that first dose to maximize public health
| (almost makes up for bumbling earlier parts of the COVID-19
| response). Second, many of the people vaccinated in the UK
| are getting single-dose vaccines, not Moderna or
| Pfizer/Bio.
| markus92 wrote:
| Source on the UK using single dose vaccines? Afaik the
| only one is the J&J one of which not a single dose has
| been delivered to the UK so far.
| evanb wrote:
| They're not using single-dose vaccines. But they are
| prioritizing (getting the first dose into as many people
| as possible) over (getting everybody who had the first
| dose their second dose the exact number of days later).
| cheradenine_uk wrote:
| Another example where the "precautionary approach" turned
| out to be the wrong one - first doses first was self-
| evidently the way to go if you read the data that came
| out of the clinical trials.
|
| Personally, as a (broadly) pro-european UK citizen -
| there's a _moral_ case that, sometime soon, we should
| make the case for exporting doses now we've covered off
| the most vulnerable in our own country. A dead person is
| a dead person.
|
| And I'm _utterly dismayed_ that the EU's behaviour has
| obliterated any chance of that getting off square 1.
| Johnson is a populist - any move to restrict
| contractually-entitled exports by the EU will have the
| red-top press screaming blue murder and will back him
| into a corner. I'd fully expect a destructive spiral from
| there on out - starting with him blocking PZ precursor
| chemicals being shipped to the EU from Yorkshire. We
| should be shifting the conversation to "haven't we done
| well; now is the time to help our friends and neighbors".
| jlouis wrote:
| Yes. UK and US have both had some export regulations on
| vaccines, which aren't present in EU. So the current flow of
| available doses isn't really a free market in the usual sense.
|
| There are other factors than dose availability though. Putting
| vaccines into people isn't easy to do on a large scale in a
| short time window. Vaccine programmes are usually running with
| a much larger window, with vaccines that doesn't require
| extreme cold temperatures.
|
| UK seems better prepared for this than many of the EU-bloc's
| countries.
|
| The other part of the question however is: "Severely lags
| behind what?". Even with a "slow" rollout, EU countries in
| general are better off than many other countries in the world.
| It isn't the case they are trying to keep up with the pack in
| general, as they are well positioned. It's more that there are
| a few countries who are doing _extremely_ well on a quick
| rollout.
| mattmanser wrote:
| There's no export restrictions in the UK, they just ordered
| vaccines earlier and in bigger bulk than the EU
| (comparatively).
|
| One of the many spats about this between the EU and the UK
| was when an EU functionary incorrectly claimed the UK had
| export controls and they had to back track[1].
|
| As far as I know, the EU gambled on a French vaccine that
| unfortunately failed, then ordered other vaccines much later
| than everyone else.
|
| [1] https://www.ft.com/content/6d28903d-3723-45cc-878a-21e1f2
| d39...
| youngtaff wrote:
| UK is also one of the producers for the lipids that are
| needed to make the pfizer vaccine and that's still being
| exported
| thefounder wrote:
| I think you are wrong. UK gov blocked exports to the EU.
|
| "Two factories in Britain run by Oxford Biomedica and Cobra
| Biologics are also listed as suppliers to the EU in the
| contract with AstraZeneca, but no vaccine has so far been
| shipped from Britain to the EU, despite Brussels' earlier
| requests."
|
| "AstraZeneca told EU officials that the UK is using a
| clause in its supply contract that prevents export of its
| vaccines until the British market is fully served, EU
| officials said."
|
| https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-eu-
| uk-...
| the_why_of_y wrote:
| The EU signed contract with AstraZeneca 1 day before the UK
| did, claims
| https://twitter.com/DaveKeating/status/1372897637469458432
|
| There's no export restriction, it's more subtle.
|
| UK has funded Oxford vaccine development on condition that
| UK gets preference for doses produced in UK (if not
| elsewhere too).
|
| This has exactly the same practical effect as an export
| ban, but it technically isn't an export ban, hence the
| recent grandstanding from UK politicians.
| xiphias2 wrote:
| As a comparision BioNTech got $445M funding from Germany
| and in return Israel is getting priority.
| tick_tock_tick wrote:
| I mean did they expect a lot with just that? The USA was
| willing to commit to billions if they delivered.
| throwaway19937 wrote:
| The Israelis paid more[1] and placed orders earlier than
| the EU; it's not surprising their orders are higher
| priority.
|
| [1] (https://www.timesofisrael.com/israel-said-to-be-
| paying-avera...)
| xiphias2 wrote:
| It wouldn't matter if Germany asked for vaccine priority
| for providing $440M, just like what US and UK did. EU is
| extremely inefficient compared to how much money it's
| spending for the pandemic.
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| Israel got priority by being 'just right' sized with an
| efficient healthcare system and being able to demonstrate
| the ability to organise a mass vaccination as quickly as
| possible. As such they acted as a very large scale test
| of what we can expect as the number of people vaccinated
| increases.
|
| I don't think this is particularly to the detriment of
| Germany. Wasn't Israel vaccinating people before Germany
| had approved any vaccination?
| chimeracoder wrote:
| In addition to everything else mentioned, the UK is also
| prioritizing first-doses while delaying the second dose far
| later than recommended (second dose at 12 weeks, instead of 3-4
| weeks)[0]. That's on top of administering first doses without
| keeping a complete stockpile for second doses (ie, they are
| betting that it will be relatively easy to obtain a supply of
| second doses when the time comes).
|
| So yes, the UK is far ahead of most other countries in first
| doses administered, but they're also going off-book for their
| vaccination protocol in a lot of ways that make it a bad point
| of comparison for other countries which are following clinical
| recommendations more closely.
|
| [0] There's some clinical evidence in support of the 12-week
| gap for the AstraZeneca vaccine, though the UK made this
| decision before that study had been released, and there is not
| yet analogous data to support the efficacy of a 12-week period
| for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which the UK is also
| administering on a 12-week gap.
| mprovost wrote:
| The UK has been vaccinating for more than 12 weeks now and
| the evidence shows that people aren't getting infected in
| that time period once they've had their first dose.
| orangecat wrote:
| Both theory and data overwhelmingly support delaying second
| doses in favor of getting first doses to more people, e.g. ht
| tps://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2021/02/fi...
| . Notably, the "recommended" 3 week delay wasn't the result
| of determining the medically optimal interval; it was chosen
| to reduce the time needed for vaccine trials.
| pfortuny wrote:
| More or less infinitely better, yes.
| toyg wrote:
| A better comparison is with US, China, or Russia. And yes, it
| doesn't look very good. The rollout has been slow for a number
| of reasons, from actual resistance in some countries to the
| well-publicised shenanigans with manufacturers. Also, Europeans
| export a significant portion of their vaccine production,
| unlike others.
| philjohn wrote:
| Well, the UK is prioritising getting as many people a first
| dose as possible, so the number "fully" vaccinated in the UK
| lags behind the EU.
|
| Jury is still somewhat out about which method is better, and
| who will finish first. I'd put money on both reaching 70% of
| eligible people vaccinated with both doses around the same
| time.
| toyg wrote:
| It's even more complex than that, since some countries have
| now switched to UK-like intervals between doses (11 weeks)...
| but not all. And there are a bunch of country-specific issues
| too.
|
| This is one of those situations where "EU" as a concept is a
| bit of an overgeneralization for 27 loosely-coordinating
| countries.
| jariel wrote:
| Yes, but the UK is so far ahead with jabs/person that it's
| going to make a the bigger difference.
|
| The volume of jabs will dictate the outcome more than the
| 1-now-1-much-later or 1-now-1-soon strategies.
| dragontamer wrote:
| Britain is one of the fastest vaccinating countries in the
| world. Maybe THE fastest (they're over 50% adults vaccinated
| already), ignoring smaller countries like Israel who don't have
| to worry about scale quite as msuch.
|
| Britain erred on the side of faster rollout: many countries
| criticize them for rushing AZ's vaccine approval process
| actually.
|
| Because Britain somewhat rushed the vaccine rollout, its
| probably not a fair comparison to other countries. USA vs EU is
| probably a better comparison (but maybe not, because USA has a
| *dominating* industrial base and can physically make more
| things than most other countries)
| tinus_hn wrote:
| Most western countries could have easily afforded to build
| their own factories but they cheapened out and didn't want to
| spend the 10 million for a one off factory. That's a lot
| harder to defend than throwing 100 million a day out of the
| window on lockdowns.
| dragontamer wrote:
| The factories needed to be set up last year, before the
| vaccines were approved.
|
| IIRC, there were well over 20+ vaccines in the USA alone
| that were being developed. I dunno about other countries...
| it turned out that the mRNA (Pfizer / Moderna) and
| adenovirus (J&J / AstraZeneca) seem to have been the
| fastest at production.
|
| Everyone who spent $Millions on other vaccines are still
| waiting for those tests to finish. Only if you were lucky
| enough to pick Pfizer / Moderna / AZ / J&J are you actually
| winning in the vaccine race right now. At this point, its
| looking like if you bet on the wrong vaccine, you lost your
| entire investment.
|
| -------------
|
| USA spent billions on building "all the above". We have
| millions of AZ-doses sitting on the shelves, waiting for
| final approval (final tests just finished this past week).
|
| UK ordered 4-doses per person (when only 2-doses are
| needed, and even though its not known if children can
| safely take the vaccine yet). That's another reason why UK
| is so fast: they aggressively bought extra vaccines at an
| extreme rate. UK plans to either sell, or donate, those
| extra vaccines later on.
|
| By buying so much extra vaccine, UK ensured that they are
| at the front of the line when it comes to vaccine supply
| from the various companies.
| oezi wrote:
| The US didn't spend significantly more than Europe, nor
| did the UK, but both did so a bit earlier and with more
| nationalistic approaches. Due to the production ramp this
| leads to 2-4 months delay for Europe. Still better than
| Canada or Mexico.
|
| That German Biontech was allowed to partner with Pfizer
| will probably have cost 100000 European lives at the end,
| while saving 200000 American ones.
| throwaway19937 wrote:
| According to
| (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/20/world/europe/europe-
| vacci...) the US spent at least 3x (10 billion) as the EU
| (3.2 billion).
| brianwawok wrote:
| Which if you look at the economic damage of a lockdown,
| either price is laughably cheap. Like this is a multi-
| trillion dollar economic event, spending even 10x that
| much would still likely be a "deal".
| astrange wrote:
| Note you don't even need the "lockdown" for the economic
| damage, it will happen anyway. People don't want to go to
| restaurants if it's going to kill their grandma.
|
| The lockdown is actually merciful for many businesses;
| it's cheaper to close a restaurant entirely than run it
| at 50% capacity, and it's the only way conventions and
| other events can get out of their contracts with their
| venues.
| dcolkitt wrote:
| Agree. I think a fair approach rather than targeting
| price would have been to pre-allocate a percent of the
| economic impact of the lockdown.
|
| If pandemic lockdowns cost about 10% of annual GDP, then
| pre-allocating 1% of GDP to vaccines seems pretty
| conservative if anything. That means something like
| $100-200 billion for the US or EU.
|
| The EU should have just pre-allocated $100 billion on
| vaccines. That would have been enough to secure every
| adult a vaccine from the big four manufacturers, plus
| leave a big pot of money leftover for contingencies.
| oezi wrote:
| The article says 10bn was the budget of project Warpspeed
| not the spend. I also would call into doubt the 3.2bn
| figure. The UK alone spent 2.9bn pounds on vaccines.
|
| Also compare: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2
| 020/12/03/9423037...
| maxerickson wrote:
| US spending exceeds $10 billion:
| https://time.com/5921360/operation-warp-speed-vaccine-
| spendi... (the Biden administration has since committed
| further funds also)
|
| That NPR article proceeds on the very unlikely assumption
| that unused vaccines will not be reallocated to other
| countries.
|
| It's also hard to really judge the potential other
| scenarios in the overall situation; the US production
| ramp up is going to benefit everyone in the medium term,
| and it's not really clear that it would have been much
| different if BioNTech partnered with a different
| manufacturer (much of the work in the US is being done at
| purpose built contract manufacturer facilities;
| AstraZenaca and J&J share some sites...).
|
| Edit: There's also the question of whether potential
| partners were really interchangeable, or if Pfizer has
| some advantage in knowledge or whatever.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| Canada ordered 9.6 doses per person, and we're
| substantially behind the US/UK.
| Robotbeat wrote:
| At least for Moderna, it wasn't pure luck to pick them. I
| was following it from near the beginning, and there was
| really solid data coming out on its effectiveness.
| Pfizer/Bio took a nearly identical approach.
|
| And overspending by buying a hundred million doses of
| each of the 20 vaccines STILL would've been a massive
| bargain.
| astrange wrote:
| Moderna and Pfizer are the "best" vaccines but it doesn't
| matter that much - everyone of them out there is good
| enough. The flu shot is only 50% effective, and all of
| these are better.
|
| Some like AZ report low top line numbers like 60%, but
| you can look at the number of severe cases needing
| hospitalization. It's still approximately zero.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| It takes more than money to build a factory. Canada started
| refitting an old GSK factory to make vaccines in May 2020.
| It'll be ready November 2021.
|
| I'm not sure where your $10M number comes from, Canada is
| spending CAD170M (USD135M).
| pacificmint wrote:
| > Maybe THE fastest
|
| Almost, but not quiet. As of 3/21 Britain has done 44 doses
| per 100 people.
|
| Israel is leading with 112, followed by United Arab Emirates
| with 74 and Chile with 44.31. These countries are all smaller
| than Britain though, as you point out. No country as big or
| bigger than Britain is doing it faster.
|
| For comparison, the US has done 37 per 100, while most of the
| EU countries are between 12-13. Hungary is at 21, because
| they have not only used the EU provided vaccines, but also
| using the Russian vaccine.
| phnofive wrote:
| 112/100?
| dragontamer wrote:
| 2-doses needed per person for Pfizer, Moderna, and AZ
| vaccines.
|
| So 200 doses per 100 people is the finish line. (Except
| now that USA just released J&J's single-dose vaccine,
| things got complicated...)
| ars wrote:
| For Israel it's actually 140 is the finish line because
| kids under 16 can't get it yet.
|
| They are pretty close - around 115 right now.
|
| They are hoping to start immunizing 12-16 in about 1 to 2
| months.
| dragontamer wrote:
| I'm under the assumption that child-vaccinations will be
| proven safe within the next few months, so the finish
| line at that point will be moved to ~200 doses per
| person.
| DrBazza wrote:
| The AZ was the second vaccine to be approved after the Pfizer
| one at the beginning of December, and then Moderna was
| approved days later.
|
| All of the vaccines passed through the standard clinical
| trials and phases and were approved by the MHRA using the
| same process that would be applied to any other vaccine.
|
| The vaccine testing and approval was fast because layers of
| bureaucracy were removed (e.g. writing proposals, securing
| funding, finding volunteers).
|
| It's not fair to say that the UK rushed either the approval
| or the rollout. It's a bit like saying Usain Bolt rushed to
| win the 100m. Someone has to do it first. The UK approval
| process is one of the most stringent in the world.
| dragontamer wrote:
| 1. USA only finished its trials this past week of AZ's
| vaccine, and those trials took place basically the same
| time as the UK's. In contrast, UK approved the vaccine in
| December 2020.
|
| The 3-months of difference between the two countries is
| pretty pronounced, no matter how you look at it.
|
| 2. https://www.businessinsider.com/uk-approved-pfizer-
| covid-19-...
|
| I remember articles at the time that highly criticized the
| UK's rollout of AZ vaccine.
|
| 3. It probably doesn't matter: the USA has found AZ to be
| very safe and highly effective: in fact, the USA's trials
| suggest a 79% efficacy rate (while the UK's own trial
| numbers were in the 60s). So if anything, the AZ vaccine
| has been proven to be safer and better in the tests on our-
| side of the Atlantic.
|
| The issue is that extra 3-months of difference. Whether
| December 2020 approval was premature or not.
| DrBazza wrote:
| > The issue is that extra 3-months of difference. Whether
| December 2020 approval was premature or not.
|
| And yet the USA approved the Pfizer vaccine on Dec 11,
| only a week after the UK.
|
| I'm not sure why there's a 3 month difference in
| approving the AZ vaccine, but I do know that the USA has
| some particularly draconian import rules on foreign
| medicines, especially untested ones, so perhaps extra
| bureaucracy, and almost certainly a different testing
| regime for medicines to the UK and EU.
|
| I'm satisfied that the UK MHRA and JVI have
| satisfactorily assessed the data from AZ, Pfizer,
| Moderna, (and Novavax). They're world experts in their
| fields.
| brianwawok wrote:
| We had Pfizer and Moderna approved. We had JJ in the
| final steps. I think there wasn't a huge urgency behind
| the fourth vaccine when all signs pointed to three good
| vaccines.
| mprovost wrote:
| Since both approval processes reached the same conclusion
| it clearly wasn't premature.
| dragontamer wrote:
| A coin-flip would have reached the same conclusion 50% of
| the time.
|
| That's why process is important: you can get lucky and
| come to the correct results with an improper process (ex:
| coin flips).
| mprovost wrote:
| I don't think you can argue that the UK's process was
| random. There is a process, it went faster, and achieved
| the same result. Maybe in some other universe it would
| have missed something and the longer process would have
| had a different result but that's not the world we live
| in, in which some not-insignificant number of people
| didn't die of covid in those 3 months.
| dragontamer wrote:
| I'm not saying the UK's process is random. I'm saying
| your logic and argument is fundamentally unsound.
|
| In 50% of the universes that exist, your logic applies
| just as easily to coin-flips / random-chance to make
| decisions.
| dbetteridge wrote:
| For 1. That would be because the FDA insisted on a US run
| phase 3 trial (which is fine) but that only began around
| the time the UK approved Oxford/AZ as AZ had first tried
| to use their UK/SA study for US approvals
| dustinmoris wrote:
| I'm not British, but I live in Britain and I can guarantee
| you that the vaccine rollout hasn't been rushed.
|
| The difference was that Britain invested early on in multiple
| vaccines, created a whole new government task force with the
| only job to get the country vaccinated, they collaborated
| between AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford in trials
| and the MHRA (which itself is one of the best if not the best
| medical regulator in the world) was running a lot of the
| approval checks in parallel which the EU and other regulators
| didn't do. Additionally the UK evaluated all data regarding
| the new COVID-19 vaccines and what we historically know from
| other vaccines that the chances of an initial one-jab
| strategy were extremely high almost to a point where it would
| be irresponsible to not first vaccinate as many people with
| one jab as possible. For once the UK put science and common
| sense above red tape and nationalistic rhetoric unlike many
| leaders in the EU like Macron or Ursula Von Der Lying.
| stevesimmons wrote:
| The UK also put a lot of effort into the full vaccine
| supply chain. And wrote a more comprehensive contract with
| AstraZeneca than the EU did. Details in the different
| approaches are here:
|
| https://www.politico.eu/article/the-key-differences-
| between-...
| noir_lord wrote:
| Exactly, they botched multiple other things but on this
| they got it right.
|
| I had my first AZ Oxford shot on Tuesday, I'm 40 and have
| health issues but nothing that is directly affected by
| COVID (though coughing is dangerous for me).
|
| Second one is due June 2nd, the first dose to as many
| people paid off, evidence was good it would but it was
| still a gamble with so many lives on the line.
| pmontra wrote:
| > they botched multiple other things but on this they got
| it right
|
| This was the single most important thing to get right
| since 1945, by a large margin.
|
| As a EU citizen I must say that the multiple layered
| structure of the EU is not worse than any other one in
| normal times but it was a disaster in these exceptional
| times. Too many indirections, nobody responsible for
| anything, the people in charge of the vaccination
| procurement not there because of elections.
| tablespoon wrote:
| The free market saves the day again!
|
| https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/20/world/europe/europe-vacci...
|
| > While Washington went into business with the drug companies,
| Europe was more fiscally conservative and trusted the free
| market.
| gaha wrote:
| The EU has exported 41 millionen vaccine doses of which the UK
| has gotten 8 million so far [1]. Meanwhile, the UK and US do not
| export any vaccines at all. So just as a back of the envelope
| calculation, with 41 millionen doeses the EU could have
| vaccinated an additional 10% of its population, while the UK
| would have had more than 10% less vaccinatetions without those 8
| million. This would not completetly close the gap, but the
| numbers would be quite different then.
|
| Anyway, you can interpret this in a postivie way: the EU is
| trying to be good and is sharing its vaccinations more or less
| fairly with other countries (for now). However, you can also see
| it as the EU has no real power at all and is just an easy target
| to get fooled over by other countries..
|
| [1] https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-eu-not-ready-to-share-
| covi...
| genghisjahn wrote:
| The US is exporting vaccines (AstraZeneca) to Canada and
| Mexico.
|
| https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-digest-us-to-send-first-va...
| mrighele wrote:
| Not "is exporting", but "plans to send", quite different.
| Meanwhile EU exported at least 3.9 million doses to Canada,
| 3.1 million doses to Mexico [1]
|
| https://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=2252
| mahkeiro wrote:
| Yes and AZ vaccine is not even approved in the US...
| [deleted]
| goatinaboat wrote:
| _The EU has exported 41 millionen vaccine doses of which the UK
| has gotten 8 million so far_
|
| Not "the EU". Private companies with factories in European
| countries fulfilled pre-orders placed and paid for months ago.
| "The EU" owns no factories and produces no vaccines itself.
| krona wrote:
| > _the EU is trying to be good and is sharing its vaccinations
| more or less fairly with other countries_
|
| The AstraZeneca factory in the Netherlands is owned by
| AstraZeneca, not the EU commission. World War 2 ended a long
| time ago.
| [deleted]
| smnrchrds wrote:
| Pfizer and Moderna production factories in the US are not
| owned by the government either, but they are prohibited from
| exporting a single dose of vaccine until the US government
| has enough doses to vaccinate the entire US population.
| krona wrote:
| If that was a condition of the contract between two parties
| and the two parties agreed, then what's the problem?
| mahkeiro wrote:
| So why are doses of AZ vaccine produced in the US not
| exported despite the fact that AZ vaccine is not approved
| in the US?
| tick_tock_tick wrote:
| They are https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/17/politics/us-
| astrazeneca-mexic...
| smnrchrds wrote:
| First of all, I don't know if this is purely contractual
| or not. Perhaps it is, perhaps it's not. But I remember
| earlier in the vaccination campaign the news talked about
| how the companies will be free to export after they have
| fulfilled their 100-million-dose obligation to the US,
| but later that changed to 300-million doses. Perhaps this
| was part of the original contact, perhaps it was forced
| on them later on. Regardless:
|
| The problem with this approach is that if this becomes
| the norm, which so far it seems it will, the next
| pandemic, the rest of the world will be mega super
| screwed. Right now, the saving grace of us folks in
| Canada is that the EU, unlike US and UK, did not prohibit
| vaccine exports. If they had put the same barriers, we
| Canadians (as well as most other nations on earth) would
| have had to wait for the great powers (US/UK/EU) to
| finish vaccinating their 16-year olds before we could
| start vaccinating our 90-year olds. So many would have
| died who would have survived if the vaccines were shared
| between countries based on population or elderly
| demographics. It would have been a net gain for US/UK/EU,
| a net loss for Canada/etc and a net loss for the world as
| a whole. That's because when you prioritize not-at-risk
| population from country A over at-risk population from
| country B, for every A citizen you save, you cause 7900
| citizens from country B to die [0].
|
| Also, let's not pretend any country could have signed
| such a contract with the vaccine manufacturers. If Canada
| tried to sign a contract with a US manufacturer that said
| they would give Canada their 96-million-dose contract
| before selling a single dose to the US, I bet the US
| government would have ripped the contact to shreds and
| imposed their own rules on it. Only the countries in
| which the vaccine producers are located can sign such
| contracts. So in practice, there is little difference
| between contract and rule-making in terms of who can do
| it and what the outcomes are.
|
| [0] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/covid-
| data/investi...
| the_why_of_y wrote:
| This is a pretty weird kind of contract?
|
| _Executive Order 13962--Ensuring Access to United States
| Government COVID-19 Vaccines December 08, 2020
|
| By the authority vested in me as President by the
| Constitution and the laws of the United States of
| America, it is hereby ordered as follows:_
|
| https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/12/11/2020
| -27...
| markus92 wrote:
| Halix is an independent contractor, AZ is not the owner at
| all.
| raducu wrote:
| The Netherlands/EU can ban exports of certain items, they can
| even nationalize factories if they wanted to.
|
| At this point I think it would be the best that they did, pay
| AZ/pfizer/moderna royalties but just use the military in a
| WW2 style effort to produce as many dosages possible.
| secondcoming wrote:
| The UK is exporting vaccine components to the EU though.
| reddotX wrote:
| source?
| secondcoming wrote:
| > Those EU facilities are in turn dependent on vaccine
| inputs -- such as the lipid nanoparticles needed in mRNA
| vaccines and the plastic bags used in bioreactors -- some
| of which are imported from the UK and the US.
|
| https://www.ft.com/content/773245da-900a-468e-aaf3-96ec8c43
| 3...
| cheradenine_uk wrote:
| https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/14400027/pfizer-warns-eu-
| threa...
|
| Block AZ in the EU, you'll force the populist Johnson into
| tit-for-tat retaliation - and we'll all go to hell in a
| hand-cart.
| reddotX wrote:
| the sun LMAO, stop reading British tabloids
| cheradenine_uk wrote:
| You don't think Croda are important then?
|
| Or that this deal doesn't exist? https://www.business-
| live.co.uk/manufacturing/croda-covid-va...
| libertine wrote:
| This has been debunked, it's just rumors with no support,
| both Pfizer and BioNTech secured critical supplies in the
| beginning of the year for EU production - internally in
| Europe (2 German companies if I recall correctly), from
| Canada, and from the UK.
|
| At best banning those exports would just harm the
| production of surplus vaccines/exports. It would be the
| UK crippling their own supply of vaccines - which they
| have received 10 million so far from Pfizer made in
| Belgium.
| cheradenine_uk wrote:
| I agree such a move would be somewhat self destructive.
| But given the uk is already >50% with a 1st dose, and has
| Moderna contracts supplying from next month, I would not
| rule it out.
|
| I also would point out: Boris, aka mini-trump. Populists
| would not let such a challenge go without reply.
|
| Good luck if you think the report is completely wrong.
| reddotX wrote:
| also AstraZeneca failed to deliver to EU in a big way. 70% less
| than agreed!!! at the same time AZ exported vaccines from EU. i
| hope EU will take legal action against AZ
| outside1234 wrote:
| When you are in a crisis, the first thing you do is put the
| oxygen mask on yourself. The crisis in the UK and the US has
| been severe and it does not help to spread the vaccine around
| peanut butter style across every country in the world such that
| only 5% of the population has it.
|
| If anything else, we should be focusing it more on single
| countries impacted the most to get their essential workers and
| most impacted covered before moving on to a next one.
| Ma8ee wrote:
| It certainly helps to vaccinate the most vulnerable people in
| all countries, instead of vaccinate everyone in certain
| countries first.
| raducu wrote:
| Actually, "putting the oxygen mask on yourself" would be the
| equivalent to vaccinating your medical staff, not your whole
| friggin country.
|
| The US and UK don't fare much worse than the rest of the EU,
| per capita, do they?
|
| USA+ UK = 34 million cases, EU=24 million cases.
|
| The biggest problem with vaccine mercantilism is if we don't
| rationally share the vaccine, the vaccine technology and
| means of production, then the fact we vaccinated 100% of one
| country will be useless in 2 years with all the variants
| mutating in less fortunate countries.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Somehow, the EU plan to over purchase (which they did
| already end of 2020, early 2021) and share surplus vaccines
| withe developing countries to _avoid_ exactly that gets
| completely ignored.
| tempestn wrote:
| As a Canadian it's certainly contributing to my goodwill toward
| the EU. We'd be SOL if they were taking the same approach as
| the US.
| birken wrote:
| In about 2 months I suspect the US is going to flooding
| Canada/Mexico with vaccine doses.
| retrac wrote:
| Canada will, with luck, already be half done with the first
| dose in two months. But yes, there's likely to be a surfeit
| in the entire developed world by July or so. The
| domestically manufactured Canadian vaccine for example, if
| approved, will likely end up primarily exported.
| tempestn wrote:
| I agree, as at that point it will be in their self-interest
| to do so. So yes, we wouldn't be completely SOL, just in
| rougher shape than we are.
|
| I certainly understand the desire to keep doses within the
| country. I don't even necessarily blame the administration
| for doing so. But I do appreciate the EU giving us the
| opportunity to vaccinate our seniors prior to 18 year olds
| in the US.
| blibble wrote:
| > However, you can also see it as the EU has no real power at
| all and is just an easy target to get fooled over by other
| countries..
|
| the position it finds itself in is entirely a result of its
| inability to competently and promptly negotiate contracts with
| its suppliers
|
| it was entirely focused on price instead of delivery, and it
| took months more than the suppliers other customers (e.g. the
| UK) to agree anything
|
| none of this is surprising behavior for an organisation that is
| primarily a producer's cartel
|
| the mistake was putting such an organisation in charge of the
| procurement in the first place
|
| the other outrageous fact is that France, Germany, Italy and
| the Netherlands (the "Inclusive Vaccine Alliance") had all but
| signed a deal back in June, then the EU commission forced
| itself into the process, spent three months trying to re-
| negotiate (for a product being produced at cost), then signed
| the original deal regardless
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| This is not true, the contract for EU and UK are largely the
| same. The EU even signed 1 day earlier.
|
| This is FUD originating from AZ, which are downright lying.
| readittwice wrote:
| No, this isn't FUD. AZ wasn't lying. Yes, it's true that
| the EU signed one particular contract one day before the UK
| on August 27. However, the UK had a binding contract with
| AZ since May already.
|
| "However, the key lies in an earlier agreement that
| AstraZeneca made back in May with the U.K., which was a
| binding deal establishing "the development of a dedicated
| supply chain for the U.K.," an AstraZeneca spokesperson
| said."
|
| This quote is from this article:
| https://www.politico.eu/article/the-key-differences-
| between-...
| snowwolf wrote:
| The origin of the UKs priority access to the AZ vaccine
| was due to their early funding of the Oxford vaccine on
| condition of 1st priority. This was before AZ even got
| involved. In fact the UK govt had such deep involvement
| that they were able to veto a deal between Oxford and
| Merck to manufacture and distribute the vaccine over
| fears that it would allow Trump to block their priority
| access through export controls (as Merck would
| manufacture in the US) so the UK make Oxford partner with
| AZ. AZ inherited that pre-existing deal between Oxford
| and the UK govt.
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| AZ is lying:
|
| Here the boss is telling the UK signed in june :
| https://www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-europe-
| inno...
|
| Except it didn't, the UK signed on august 28th, 1 day
| after the EU (per your link).
|
| In the interview from my link he also says that no
| vaccines manufactured in the EU leave for countries
| outside of the EU.
|
| Except he lies about that too: Italy prohibited the
| export of vaccines to Australia. Last i checked Australia
| is not a part of the EU.
| [deleted]
| Zenst wrote:
| I'm not sure AZ said otherwise. I did check and you are
| correct about signing date.
|
| However the devil as always is in the detail and the two
| contracts are different and best covered here:
| https://www.politico.eu/article/the-key-differences-
| between-...
|
| Crux being the UK contract was a contractual commitment to
| deliver whilst the EU contract was best effort.
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| This link says that the contract are comparable:
| https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/astrazeneca-
| signed-va...
| markvdb wrote:
| I do not care one single iota about who was first or paid
| most. What is clear is that people are dying unnecessarily
| because of this competition. The ethical thing would to be
| minimise the number of people dying of covid-19.
|
| Distributing these vaccines evenly based upon risk factors
| (age, BMI, ...) is what should have happened. Practical
| example:
|
| - My double marathon running, under 40 brother in law in
| Israel is low risk. He should not have received the vaccine
| yet, even if I like him.
|
| - My heavily overweight 71 years old father is high risk. He
| should have received the vaccine already.
|
| The EU, the UK, the US, Israel _and_ most of the
| manufacturers failed abysmally at this.
| blibble wrote:
| > Distributing these vaccines evenly based upon risk
| factors (age, BMI, ...) is what should have happened.
|
| this is exactly what the UK has been doing?
|
| https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/17157/productio
| n...
| iso1210 wrote:
| I suspect the poster was saying that 80 year olds in
| India should receive the vaccination before 50 year olds
| in New York
| hackeraccount wrote:
| Does that even make sense?
|
| What if your 71 year old father is an agoraphobic hermit
| and your brother has some wonder job that puts him in a
| position to literally save the lives of other people as
| long as he's in close proximity to them.
|
| I understand this is a hard to credit hypothetical but in
| those circumstances or similar ones we might want your
| brother at the head of the line. Not because he's more
| likely to die but because he's more likely to infect me. Or
| say, any hypothetical fellow citizen.
|
| Frankly I think the most critical thing is to get as many
| people vaccinated as quickly as possible. Any other
| criteria should come after "as many as quickly." After that
| sure, have an argument over if more important to get people
| who might die vaccinated or people who might spread it
| vaccinated. Knock yourself out - but don't get in the way
| of the critical thing.
| optimiz3 wrote:
| Straight out disagree. One of the most fundamental purposes
| of a country is to prioritize the interests (and most
| fundamentally life) of its own citizens.
|
| If countries agreed on things like resource distribution,
| human rights, economic structure, reward incentives,
| culture, there would be no need for different nations.
|
| This is purely a negotiation. "Ethics" is a weak appeal
| stemming from a failure to plan, invest, and execute.
| stale2002 wrote:
| > The ethical thing would to be minimise the number of
| people dying of covid-19.
|
| Yes and when the EU delays signing contracts, and focuses
| so much on price, they cause more people to die from covid
| by slowing the process along.
|
| I agree that the best way forward would have been to
| minimize deaths of covid, by them not worrying so much
| about prices and instead supporting development of the
| vaccine as quickly as possible.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| It seems that they focused too much on price.
|
| Like if a few cents or even a few euros per dose would make
| any difference considering the accruing cost of the pandemic.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Problems like these, availability of goods and
| distribution, are usually not solved by throwing money at
| them.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| On the contrary, that's exactly how they are solved.
|
| You can entice suppliers to serve you first by paying
| more than others, that's what Israel did.
|
| I don't think that distribution is an issue but that can
| also be resolved by throwing money directly or through
| resources at it. Same for production and supply.
|
| It was useless and counter-productive to drag
| negotiations to lower prices while throwing away 10s of
| billions a month to prop up locked down economies. It
| would have been more useful to work with suppliers to go
| all in on production with unlimited funds and resources
| so that as many factories as possible could produce (and
| that would have probably been cheaper overall).
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| The EU has received more than 62 million doses (of all
| vaccines) and has more than 10 million doses _in stock_.
|
| They've also created problems to the AZ vaccine at every turn.
| So much so that now some people simply refuse it.
|
| So if they hadn't shipped 8 million doses to the UK (where that
| vaccine was developed with public funds) there is no guarantee
| at all that they would have vaccinated 8 million more people.
|
| Edit with non-UK source (as of 2 weeks ago):
|
| " _Millions of Vaccines in EU Unused (March 11, 10:00 a.m. ET)
| More than 11.5 million Covid vaccine doses that have been
| delivered to European Union countries have not yet been used,
| according to Bloomberg. The number of shots sent by
| manufacturers now totals 54.2 million, compared to 46 million a
| week previously. The data covers the week to March 7._ [1]
|
| [1]
| https://www.supplychainbrain.com/articles/31024-coronavirus-...
| bArray wrote:
| I believe several EU Countries have still not cleared AZ for
| use on (false?) fears of blood clots. And then there is the
| problem of distribution - not so easy in a place as large as
| the EU.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| First some countries refused to give the AZ vaccine to
| people _over_ 65, then they recklessly suspended it
| altogether, now some countries refuse to give it to people
| _under_ 55. That 's ridiculous.
|
| Distribution is no more a problem than in the UK. The EU
| has probably the best infrastructure in the world and vast
| resources, while being smaller than the US.
| sprafa wrote:
| Way to go on repeating UK media disinformation.
| outoftheabyss wrote:
| You keep repeating the same claim in this thread, a claim
| that runs counter to citations you are provided with and
| here you are, yet to provide any reliable sources of your
| own
| kjakm wrote:
| Nonsense. This isn't really about countries exporting/not
| exporting. These vaccine deals are with private companies who
| produce their product around the world. Just because vaccines
| are manufactured in a specific country doesn't make them
| property of that country.
|
| Whichever country is contractually at the front of the line
| will have their order fulfilled first/according to the terms of
| the contracts.
|
| The EU wasted months negotiating lower prices and then took
| longer with approvals.
|
| There is no good guy or bad guy (at least until the UK or EU
| blocks exports preventing execution of the private contracts -
| at that point the country blocking the exports becomes the bad
| guy).
| hourislate wrote:
| >Whichever country is contractually at the front of the line
| will have their order fulfilled first/according to the terms
| of the contracts.
|
| Tell that to Canada. They were securing doses from day one
| and still suffered from delayed shipments and now have to
| contend with countries of manufacture forbidding export. What
| really pisses me off is that the US Gov had 30 million doses
| of Astra for several months and it it isn't even approved for
| use. Why hoard it when you can save lives in other countries
| while you have no intention of using it soon if ever? Sure
| they might get their approval in May or June but by then I
| expect the other manufacturers to have ramped up to cover
| everyone everywhere.
| zdragnar wrote:
| My understanding is that the manufacturer of the vaccine
| didn't apply for emergency approval- they are letting it go
| through a longer process by their own choice.
|
| There might be perfectly valid reasons for this- I am not
| sure to what extent the government could or would want to
| force it to fast-track.
| bonzini wrote:
| Probably the same reason why the manufacturer hasn't
| requested EU approval of the Dutch plant where they
| manufacture vaccines exported to the UK. That is, to make
| more money.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| The time-wasting meme is a lie from the UK Government. The UK
| contract was signed _after_ the EU contract. They posted the
| contract by accident which was picked up on in some of the
| press. It also had the same clauses as the EU.
|
| On the other hand the UK still has a fully nationalised
| health service which means that it was in a much better
| position to be able to scale the vaccinations. That's
| probably the real reason that they're ahead.
|
| Give it another 10 years of Tory rule and they'll "catch
| down" to the rest of the world.
| adav wrote:
| The EU "time-wasting meme" comes from a direct quote from
| the AZ CEO.
|
| According to Dominic Cummings recent select committee
| hearing, the vaccine programme was largely built
| outside/adjacent to any existing NHS processes. It was
| given NHS branding for public trust reasons (just like the
| new-from-the-ground-up Track and Trace endeavour).
| einarvollset wrote:
| Sources? I've heard the "EU signed before UK" multiple
| times now, but nobody ever links to a source. It just seems
| unlikely, no? Why would they be so catastrophically far
| behind in that case?
|
| Similarly - the NHS is great, but not unique. Norway for
| example has a system akin to the NHS (and so do _many_ EU
| countries) and there 's no correlation there. Norway is
| _waaaaay_ behind the UK and the US. Again, it seems
| unlikely that the NHS is the cause.
|
| It's obvious you hate the Tories, but that shouldn't cloud
| your judgment to such a degree that you fail to celebrate
| the real achievement of the UK's vaccination rate.
| liversage wrote:
| It's my impression that the vaccination program in
| Denmark is very efficient just like in the UK. However,
| the speed is limited by the vaccine imports which are
| governed by deals made by the EU. I would think that
| Norway is similarly limited by imports. (They are not in
| the EU so probably are making deals at a national level.)
| Mvandenbergh wrote:
| This is a misunderstanding, as incidentally is the claim
| that the UK contract was signed three months earlier,
| because in both cases there is the assumption that there is
| "a" contract and no money flowed or contractual obligations
| were created before then. The reality is that in both
| cases, memoranda of understanding, investment agreements,
| and all sorts of other documents also exist and in some
| cases were signed earlier. In particular, there were
| agreements first with Oxford and then with AZ to start
| scaling capacity very early and even before the notional
| purchase contract signature in May (that's the one that was
| later superseded at the same time as the final EU contract
| was signed).
|
| So it is simultaneously true that they signed a contract
| within a few days of each other, but also not quite the
| full picture.
| stupidcar wrote:
| The original claim regarding the EU dragging its feet over
| signing the contract was made by the AstraZeneca CEO, not
| the UK government. And the UK's contract is _not_ entirely
| the same as the EU 's. For example, the EU waived its right
| to sue AstraZeneca for delivery failures, something the UK
| did not. This article by Politico does a good job of going
| beyond the rather reductive coverage (both pro-UK and pro-
| EU) in most of the press coverage of this affair, and
| digging more deeply into the facts:
|
| https://www.politico.eu/article/the-key-differences-
| between-...
|
| The conclusion, at least as I interpret it, is that both
| the UK and the EU can reasonably claim to have priority,
| based on their respective contracts, but that the UK did a
| better job than the EU in making theirs enforceable. Hence,
| AstraZeneca has prioritised them, while the EU has been
| forced to resort to political rather than legal measures to
| attempt redress (publishing the contract, export controls,
| etc.). And the UK's closer ties to the AstraZeneca vaccine
| project likely did mean they started work on the UK supply
| chain somewhat earlier than in the EU, even although the
| final contracts were signed essentially simultaneously (one
| day apart).
|
| I honestly don't really see this as an affair with clear
| good guys and bad guys, but it seems like most people are
| determined to do so, and inevitably along the lines of
| their pre-existing sympathies.
| Mvandenbergh wrote:
| Part of the issue, and this is something that both AZ and
| the EC fucked up in their contract negotiations is not
| thinking about this contingency. "Best reasonable
| efforts" is pretty clear... if you only have one
| customer.
|
| If you have multiple customers, who signed slightly
| different contracts at different times, and who also have
| different side agreements regarding specific facilities
| they may have paid for in part or in whole, you really
| need to define how you make allocation decisions in case
| of shortfall so that everyone understands their risk
| exposure.
|
| I will personally hold the EC responsible because
| although AZ has also messed up by not negotiating a
| clearer contract, it is the EC that indirectly works for
| me and it is their job to think about this on my and my
| family's behalf. Had they understood the consequences of
| being so far back in the production queue much earlier
| they could have spent more on upgrading production but it
| is not clear to me that they even understood this until
| January. While I'm sure that they are trying their best,
| and bad luck with Sanofi plays a part here as well (as
| does the incompetence of e.g. the Dutch government in
| managing distribution), I am pretty unimpressed with how
| they have dropped the ball here.
|
| It's not good them saying, "oh AZ isn't producing as much
| as they thought they would". Ok, cool story bro but
| they're making a novel biological, so you should have
| anticipated this and done more to prepare plans B, C, all
| the way through F. Not just placed a few commercial
| orders and then hope it all works out.
| SiempreViernes wrote:
| I think the underlying problem is that there is just not
| _any_ real cooperation on global vaccine distribution.
| Certainly the details about the enforceability of the
| various contracts wouldn 't matter if the customers all
| talk between themselves and agree on what would be
| acceptable modifications of the delivery schedule.
|
| In the event, it seems neither Boris nor Biden seem very
| interested in considering anyone else before they've
| scored enough points at home, and meanwhile real
| international cooperation on vaccine deliveries is dead.
| Oh well, hope not all trade follows that pattern _shrug_.
| sprafa wrote:
| You're being fed misinformation. EU countries signed before
| the UK.
| reddotX wrote:
| most brexiteers only read the British tabloids. explains
| their disconnect with reality
| kjakm wrote:
| The parent comment is a reply to me so I'll assume you're
| also referring to me:
|
| 1. I voted remain and would again.
|
| 2. Everybody I've spoken to that actually lives in the EU
| agrees the EU has screwed up - it seems to mostly be
| remain voters who can't move on who disagree with this.
|
| 3. If you have evidence contrary to my comment share it,
| keep the personal attacks to yourself.
| thu2111 wrote:
| Can you give a citation for that. The generally agreed
| figure is that it was done 3 months later. Bear in mind,
| the EU has still not even approved production from the AZ
| Halix plant. EU has generally been doing things slower than
| the UK.
| mr_aks wrote:
| The EU hasn't approved AZ Halix because AZ hasn't applied
| yet: https://www.ft.com/content/8e2e994e-9750-4de1-9cbc-3
| 1becd2ae... (apologies for the paywall).
|
| Relevant quote:
|
| Asked about the Halix situation, the commission said on
| Friday that the EMA was ready to fast-track authorisation
| of new production facilities once it received an
| application and the necessary information from
| AstraZeneca.
| jarvist wrote:
| CEO of AstraZeneca: "But the UK contract was signed three
| months before the European vaccine deal." "When we entered
| the agreement with Oxford, they had already been working
| with the UK government on this. "
|
| https://www.repubblica.it/cronaca/2021/01/26/news/interview
| _...
| stale2002 wrote:
| Its more complicated than that. These deal are not
| executed, the moment the final signature is signed.
|
| Instead, there are multiple steps along the way, that
| matter much more than some singular data point of a very
| long contract process that has many stages.
| benlumen wrote:
| The original comment, and this retort, sums up the argument
| in a nutshell. I see both sides of this one, offered both of
| these arguments to a friend last night. It's complicated,
| like most of these things.
| [deleted]
| hamax wrote:
| So both UK and US are bad guys since they're blocking all
| exports?
| kjakm wrote:
| I'm aware of the US blocking exports of certain things but
| as far as I know the UK isn't. If you have evidence proving
| otherwise I'd love to see.
| dbetteridge wrote:
| Per the above, no.
|
| The UK purchased right of first refusal on the first
| 100million doses of Oxford/AZ produced in the UK factories
| that they funded.
|
| The EU also funded factories (in the EU) but did not
| purchase right of first refusal only best efforts
| contracts.
|
| The USA has a full ban on exports till they are ready to
| export.
| heraclius wrote:
| There is no UK prohibition on exports.
|
| The UK is not blocking exports. The EU were free to
| conclude contracts with the (not very productive) UK
| manufacturers at the same time HM government was doing so.
| dan-robertson wrote:
| Sure it's private companies but it wasn't random chance that
| led to AstraZeneca (a British-Swedish company) working with
| the Oxford group in the U.K. or Pfizer (an American company)
| with BioNTech. It's a lot easier to control production when
| it happens within your borders (eg Trump did have some
| executive order banning exports but this was just symbolic
| when the defence production act was invoked.)
| jimbob45 wrote:
| BioNTech is German and Pfizer is American. Am I missing
| something?
| dan-robertson wrote:
| Pfizer has big factories in the US for making vaccines.
| How many does BioNTech have in Germany?
| sitic wrote:
| The current bottleneck in the Pfizer vaccine production
| is the last manufacturing stage -- combining the mRNA
| with lipid nanoparticles. There are currently two plants
| for it, one in the US and one in Belgium. The US plant
| only delivers to the USA, the Belgian to the rest of the
| world.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pfizer%E2%80%93BioNTech_COV
| ID-...
| csnweb wrote:
| They (BioNTech) themselves have only a few in Germany (2
| or 3), but it's produced by other companies for them now
| as well totalling to around seven according to this
| German source: https://www.pharma-
| food.de/markt/standorte-corona-impfstoff-.... I say
| around because not all do the whole production sometimes
| only parts of it as it seems. Didn't dig very deep into
| it.
| einarvollset wrote:
| Trump never invoked the Defense Production Act.
| blhack wrote:
| Yes he did:
| https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/18/politics/trump-defense-
| produc...
| dan-robertson wrote:
| But Biden did, right?
| einarvollset wrote:
| Yep
| optimiz3 wrote:
| > President Trump first invoked the DPA in late March
| 2020 in response to the coronavirus pandemic...limiting
| the export of medical goods, increasing domestic
| production of masks and ventilators
|
| https://www.lawfareblog.com/understanding-bidens-
| invocation-...
|
| Nothing in there on vaccine export.
| einarvollset wrote:
| It is not I don't think, but I could be wrong.
| bengale wrote:
| The EU didn't make them, companies with facilities in the EU
| did. They were exported because the EU managed to delay its
| procurement process and other countries made their orders
| earlier.
| libertine wrote:
| No country is making vaccines, yet are allowing for their
| production and exporting. Well, some countries at least, in
| this case the EU, China, India and Russia so far. The only
| countries that haven't allowed exports is USA and UK.
|
| The EU could take both the US or the UK route to prevent
| these exports:
|
| - The EU could rightfully, and has the power to, prevent
| exports that are essential in a period of crises - which
| clearly applies to the current situation in Europe. This is
| the USA route, and it's legitimate.
|
| - The EU can control AZ exports to guarantee they are
| fulfilling their contractual obligations, which AZ has been
| literally joking in the face of the EU. This is the UK route,
| and it's legitimate.
|
| What the media is currently reporting is the second one, the
| EU is forcing the manufacturer to comply with their contract.
| If this overlaps with the UK contract, well then that's
| something I believe the UK must deal with the manufacturer
| like the EU has been doing for the past 3 months.
|
| I just don't get the double standards, the UK enforcing a
| contract is good... the EU doing the same is... bad?
| BruiseLee wrote:
| > I just don't get the double standards, the UK enforcing a
| contract is good... the EU doing the same is... bad?
|
| Well, it looks like British tabloids are influencing this
| point of view in English speaking countries.
| hogFeast wrote:
| ...and because politicians in the EU told citizens it might
| be dangerous. Fine, believe all the conspiracy theories about
| the UK stealing vaccines...the EU has literally millions of
| doses sitting around going unused because citizens won't take
| it (it is almost verging on mania: in Germany I have heard
| that 50% of health workers at some hospitals who had the
| vaccination are calling in sick after getting the vaccine).
|
| I am not sure why there is even a discussion on these points:
| the EU was late, and once they were late they did almost
| everything wrong (unsurprisingly, countries in Europe have a
| terrible record on vaccines)...that is it.
| quietbritishjim wrote:
| The official line from these companies always seems to be that
| they were able to ramp up production to make the vaccines for
| the UK because the UK committed to its order signficantly
| earlier than the EU. (I've never seen this next bit said
| explicitly, but the subtext, as I read it, is that the EU was
| holding out for a better price.)
|
| Of course I don't know the accuracy of such statements. But if
| that is true, you could certainly argue it would unfair that
| the EU should benefit from production capacity that only exists
| because of commitments made by the UK, and the location of the
| factories is fairly irrelevant to that.
|
| You could counter argue that I am mistakenly treating the "EU"
| and "UK" as a single individual person each who deserves to
| suffer the consequences of their actions, when in fact the
| people suffering are individual citizens who had almost no
| control over the negotiation process. But, on the flip side, if
| companies cannot rely on agreements made during difficult
| negotiations to be honoured then it will be harder to secure
| such agreements in future.
| albertop wrote:
| A good summary of EU problems is described [1]. Washington
| and London understood that crucial to mass procurement was
| throwing large amounts of R&D money at many companies in
| hopes some would work. Brussels focused on haggling down the
| cost per dose. Europeans pay a few dollars less per dose but
| ended near the back of the shipment line.
|
| [1] http://archive.is/M0bjW
| hef19898 wrote:
| Which is too simplistic. The UK, the US and the EU depend
| on their local manufacturing capacity. That capacity is
| limited, regardless initial delivery schedules were
| sufficient for herd immunity in the EU around June/July
| with a significant surplus in Q3/4. That surplus was slated
| to be shared with developing countries.
|
| Solid plan, solid procurement strategy. But after that
| procurement, nothing. No coordination of national campaigns
| with manufacturers, no planning on local and regional
| level, no operational procurement plan. And the list goes
| on.
| mr_aks wrote:
| The EU actually signed a contract with AstraZeneca on August
| 27, a day earlier than the UK:
| https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/17/europe/uk-astrazeneca-
| vac....
| [deleted]
| readittwice wrote:
| Again, this is simply not true. Yes, the UK signed one
| particular contract on Aug 28, so one day after the EU with
| AZ. However, the UK had a binding contract with AZ since
| May.
|
| "However, the key lies in an earlier agreement that
| AstraZeneca made back in May with the U.K., which was a
| binding deal establishing "the development of a dedicated
| supply chain for the U.K.," an AstraZeneca spokesperson
| said."
|
| Quote is from this article:
| https://www.politico.eu/article/the-key-differences-
| between-...
| [deleted]
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| What makes this so painful for me is that person responsible,
| the comission president von der Leyen, was not actually
| elected by the people.
|
| We need some massive reforms and rebuilding after this. There
| already was a lot of EU scepticism, and instead of taking
| this opportunity to shine, they completely squandered it and
| destroyed trust.
| iso1210 wrote:
| Commission president was decided by the heads of each
| democratically elected government - so Merkel, Sanchez,
| Johnson, Macron etc.
|
| Just like in the UK where the PM is elected by each
| democratically elected MP
| timthorn wrote:
| > Just like in the UK where the PM is elected by each
| democratically elected MP
|
| That's not the case. The PM is appointed by the Monarch,
| who will almost always choose the leader of the party
| able to command a majority in the House of Commons. That
| leader will be chosen according to the rules of their
| party. Boris Johnson won an election where all eligible
| members of the Conservative Party had a vote; it is the
| case that the shortlist of two was decided by MPs.
|
| The PM is also a regular MP and has to be elected by
| their local constituency voters.
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| They promised us that the candidate of the strongest
| party will get the job.
| hef19898 wrote:
| Isn't the EVP the strongest block in the EU parliament
| right now?
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| Yes, but the candidate was Weber. Von der Leyen didn't
| even run for parliament.
|
| It was all a big deuce dropped on the parliament, really.
| The parliament is the only directly elected body in the
| EU, and the nations governments hate the idea that it
| could gain any kind of real power.
| hef19898 wrote:
| The German chancellor is elected the same way. There is
| nothing preventing a candidate change after the election,
| plus there is no way to tell which coalition will
| actually form. And still almost nobody would argue that
| the German federal government isn't democratically
| legitimized.
| readittwice wrote:
| The president could prevent that though and could ask for
| a re-election in case of a candidate change after the
| election. So not nothing ;)
|
| Almost no one would argue that because AFAIK that never
| happened. Pretty sure people would argue that way as soon
| as this happens.
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| I mean why do all of you just keep ignoring what I'm
| saying?
|
| We were promised that the candidate of the winning party
| would get the job!
|
| All parties in the election agreed to that. We had
| debates between the candidates rooted on that promise.
| The whole election was based on that.
|
| The EU has serious problems with democratic legitimacy,
| it has serious problems with Trust, and yet people defend
| those moves because they are technically legal.
|
| The voters were told one thing and they got another
| thing.
|
| And then the EU does an about-face and wonders why there
| is so many people distrusting it.
|
| Do you want the EU to succeed or not? If you want it to
| succeed, like I do, we have to call out the issues and
| fix them, instead of defending broken things because we
| still believe in the whole.
|
| The EU will never reach its potential if we don't mature
| it's political system and give the people some direct,
| visible control.
| andrepd wrote:
| The thing most people don't realise is that the EU is
| almost completely undemocratic, which is pretty crazy when
| you think about it for a minute.
|
| On the other hand it's also no surprise considering how it
| evolved: a producer's cartel for the coal and steel, and
| later agricultural, industries.
|
| It's a miracle it even works so well as it does.
| theaeolist wrote:
| This is not by some accident of history. It is a deliberate
| decision of euro-skeptic countries to avoid turning the EU
| into a superstate. It is usually the same countries who
| then go to complain about the "democratic deficit" of the
| EU institutions. I went through the Brexit referendum
| debates and the hypocrisy was rank.
| thu2111 wrote:
| It is possible for the EU to both have a democratic
| deficit, and for the completely opaque and unaccountable
| process for choosing the head of the Commission to be a
| part of that. Bear in mind, the EU Parliament is not a
| real parliament, so it does not improve things much when
| the 'spitzenkandidaten' is selected. That's how Juncker
| happened, a literal alcoholic. EU always ends up with
| failures at the top, it seems to be an unwritten law.
| [deleted]
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| Exactly. This is one the first things we have to fix. The
| relationship between the nations government and the EU is
| in parts absurd.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| The simple reform is to not have EU handle vaccine
| procurement anymore.
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| Valid opinion, but I disagree.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Fair disagreement!
| reddotX wrote:
| yawn.. why do you brexiteers even care about EU anymore?
| The European Commission isn't directly elected by citizens
| in the EU but the President of the Commission needs to be
| approved by Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) who
| are elected by voters from member states. MEPs also vote on
| whether to approve Commissioners who are nominated by
| governments of member states. In no country citizens
| directly elect the government. EU commission EU's
| government. The commission president is equivalent with a
| PM
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| I'm Austrian and pro EU.
|
| We were promised that the candidate of the strongest
| party in the parliament election will get the job.
|
| Every time this comes up people explain to me again what
| I already know, and never ever they seem to remember what
| the people were promised before the election.
| [deleted]
| xiphias2 wrote:
| I'm not sure that I would call the number of Pfitzer/BioNTech
| vaccines exported to young people in Israel fair so that they
| can party, while my parents inside the EU are waiting locked in
| for half a year now because they are scared of dying (and some
| of their friends already dead from COVID :( )
| ars wrote:
| Israel paid a LOT more for the vaccine to ensure early
| supply.
|
| They are also _tiny_ - a lot smaller than you might think,
| they are not really hogging all that much supply in terms of
| absolute numbers.
|
| And finally they agreed to be the research study for the
| world, so what they are doing does have value, even for your
| parents in the EU. In particular they will answer the
| question: If you immunize everyone does COVID stop?
| inglor_cz wrote:
| The EU decided to spend 750 billion euro of money it does not
| have (on credit - see [0]) for post-Covid recovery, but at
| the same time decided to save as much as possible on
| vaccines. I think that 'penny wise, pound foolish' applies.
| It would be unfair to Israel if they paid extra surcharge for
| their vaccines and later were told by European authorities
| "sorry, we will confiscate them, bad luck."
|
| If we instead paid some 10 extra euro per dose, it would have
| added up to about 1 per cent of the planned recovery fund -
| and an extra factory or two could have been built during last
| autumn to start cranking out the vaccines by millions as soon
| as approved.
|
| [0] https://www.dw.com/en/eu-agrees-on-750-billion-euro-
| recovery...
| CyberRage wrote:
| Wow, you almost make it seem like Israel has done something
| wrong.
|
| Nope, it was EU. the EU wanted to wait for final, concrete
| results before mass adoption.
|
| The EU was very skeptical regarding the vaccines. the EU
| wanted to perform bulk orders as a union which complicated
| the ordering process.
|
| The issue is not necessary the number of vaccines but the
| entire infrastructure to ship, cool and vaccinate people.
|
| Israel had good existing infrastructure, willingness to pay
| up-front and high demand for the vaccine.
|
| * will note that Israel also agreed to share vaccination data
| with Pfizer to locate any anomalies\problems
| xiphias2 wrote:
| There's no issue with the infrastructure, the Pfizer
| vaccines are not coming, because Israel has priority. I'm
| not saying Israel did anything wrong, they are protecting
| their population and payed the price for it, while EU was
| trying to get the price of the vaccine down instead of
| thinking about the consequences of every lost day.
|
| Also if infrastructure whould be a problem, US solved it by
| just hoarding vaccines: at the end of the year they had 40M
| Moderna vaccines on stock, they weren't able to use it, but
| they didn't give it to other countries.
| CyberRage wrote:
| France, a while back, was receiving good numbers but were
| failing to keep up in terms of demand\infrastructure.
|
| I think now EU is far more active when it comes to the
| efforts but initially, they were not.
|
| It seems like there is more resistance in the EU to
| vaccination and data sharing than in Israel.
| GuB-42 wrote:
| France has no problem vaccinating people, they just
| adjust their strategy based on deliveries.
|
| If you look here https://covidtracker.fr/vaccintracker/
| you'll see that on the second graph, the blue curves
| (vaccination) closely follow the gray curve (deliveries).
|
| And while France is one of the most anti-vaccine
| countries in the world, there is still no shortage of
| people wanting to be vaccinated.
|
| In the end, I just think it is just the result of
| negotiations. Now, it is essentially a zero-sum game, the
| only way to get more doses is to take it from others, and
| the EU wasn't as aggressive. We will all get vaccines in
| the end, it is just about how much you value your head
| start.
| xiphias2 wrote:
| There's resistance to AstraZeneca vaccine, and in my
| country (Hungary) to Sinopharm and SPUTNIK-V. Russian
| troops invaded Hungary in the past, so there's not much
| trust in a Russian vaccine, we trust the EU and US more,
| but the government is laundering lots of money by getting
| vaccines from the east (they payed $31 per dose for
| Sinopharm vaccine)
| CyberRage wrote:
| You're looking at thing as they are now.
|
| Now, as I've said, there's demand\need since the EU
| scaled up the vaccination efforts however, look back 3-5
| months.
|
| EU was discussing just how to split\manage the vaccines
| among the union members, while Israel was vaccinating at
| a neck-breaking pace.
|
| While my family in EU were not sure if they want to be
| vaccinated, people in Israel were waiting hours in line
| to even get a chance to get vaccinated.
|
| Israel currently has over 80% of the population
| vaccinated, I'm willing to bet that even if you provide
| that number of vaccines to any European country, the
| numbers will be far lower.
| ben_w wrote:
| "Fair" isn't well defined at the best of times.
|
| I certainly want this all over ASAP, the vaccination isn't as
| fast as I want; my biggest concern right now is the overlap
| between anti-mask-and-and-lockdown protestors and anti-
| vaccination protestors.
| xiphias2 wrote:
| I wish anti-vaccination protest would be real, that would
| mean that I would get my own vaccine faster, but I don't
| see that happening.
| cdash wrote:
| Just so you know, this sounds a lot like classic european
| anti-semitism.
| remirk wrote:
| I have never really understood why you can't criticize
| Israeli politics without it sounding like antisemitism.
| Ma8ee wrote:
| It doesn't sound like antisemitism. Some people choose to
| pretend all criticism of the state of Israel is.
|
| -Israel is an apartheid state.
|
| -You fucking nazi!
| ars wrote:
| Nah, that particular comment was not antisemitism.
|
| But to answer your question: There are a TON of
| antisemitic people in the world, but they know they can't
| talk that way, so they pretend that are "anti-Israel"
| instead. Most people can see right through that, some
| can't.
|
| This doesn't happen to other countries, so the situation
| with Israel is unique.
| xiphias2 wrote:
| I'm half Jewish (49% according to 23andMe), and I have a
| picture of 10 people of my own family killed in a mass
| grave, so I couldn't be farther from an anti-semite. Also I
| have no problem with Israel, as I said (I have far
| relatives there). What I don't like is the mix of price
| based capitalistic distribution for the countries, but not
| priced based capitalisic distribution of vaccines for the
| people. It's fake humanitarian and fake capitalism at the
| same time.
| onetimemanytime wrote:
| Export? USA and UK bought those vaccines a year ago from
| Pfizer, Moderna, J&J and AstraZeneca. Warp Speed, USA gambled
| and the world is better because of it.
|
| They are contracts and dates on which x million doses are to be
| delivered by. Why didn't EU do the same? Crying now it's too
| late and a trade war can go both ways. Say, no vaccine would be
| produced unless a certain item that is produced in USA goes to
| a Belgium factory.
| brmgb wrote:
| The USA negociated more slowly than the EU. The UK signed a
| research deal before the EU but didn't order until a week
| later.
|
| The only difference is that the EU remained truthful to the
| free market while both the USA and the UK put country first
| closes.
|
| > Crying now it's too late and a trade war can go both ways.
|
| There are no trade wars. Both the USA and the UK have shown
| themselves to be extremely unreliable partners which will not
| respect the rules they profess to believe in as soon as it
| doesn't favor them. That was already obvious with Trump and
| is only more obvious now.
|
| I fully expect the USA to lose its place as the main global
| power in the next decade if not sooner. The UK will probably
| pay the price a lot sooner as the EU is not going to forget
| and they have no other reliable ally.
| onetimemanytime wrote:
| OK, show me a press release mentioning orders, contracts.
|
| _" The EU reached a deal with Pfizer in November for 300
| million doses and in January negotiated a preliminary deal
| for another 300 million."_ https://www.dw.com/en/eu-
| orders-300-million-more-biontech-pf...
|
| USA agreed to buy 100-500 Million in JULY 2020
| https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/22/health/pfizer-
| covid-19-va...
|
| The fact is that EU is too slow, too risk adverse and 28
| countries must agree. In USA the President winks, and it's
| done. (In this case it was beneficial.)
| ben_w wrote:
| > The fact is that EU is too slow, too risk adverse and
| 28 countries must agree.
|
| Not strictly true, as for these purposes the UK was still
| bound by EU rules until Jan 1st this year and did its own
| thing for the vaccinations without breaking those rules.
|
| The EU nations generally like to work together and
| negotiate as one, as doing so saves money; money was the
| wrong thing to optimise for in this case.
| dumpsterdiver wrote:
| > The EU nations generally like to work together and
| negotiate as one, as doing so saves money; money was the
| wrong thing to optimise for in this case.
|
| Right. Probably should have optimized for human life.
| Hindsight is 20/20.
| strictnein wrote:
| > The USA negociated more slowly than the EU.
|
| The US signed their AZ deal months before the EU and UK.
| They threw billions of dollars at every company they could
| find, readily paying high rates while other countries tried
| to negotiate lower ones. So I'm really not sure where this
| idea of yours comes from.
|
| $1.2 Billion to AZ in May:
| https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2020/05/21/trump-
| administrati...
|
| EU's deal was signed in August:
| https://www.fiercepharma.com/manufacturing/az-
| nets-396m-down...
|
| $1.95 Billion to Pfizer in July:
| https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/10/health/was-the-pfizer-
| vac...
|
| EU's deal with Pfizer was in November:
| https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-
| deta...
| systemvoltage wrote:
| Didn't Italy just recently tried to block exports to
| Australia?
| Aengeuad wrote:
| Minor nitpick but the UK signed a deal with AZ a couple
| of days before the US, it was the EU that was 3 months
| late to the party.
|
| Clicking through your second link you get to the article
| about the US deal on the 21st of May:
| https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/astrazeneca-
| scores-1b-fr...
|
| and again for the UK deal on the 17th of May:
| https://www.fiercepharma.com/pharma/after-signing-up-to-
| deli...
| dumpsterdiver wrote:
| > There are no trade wars.
|
| There are trade wars, and there will continue to be.
|
| > Both the USA and the UK have shown themselves to be
| extremely unreliable partners which will not respect the
| rules they profess to believe in as soon as it doesn't
| favor them.
|
| That's rich coming from the folks responsible for GDPR. You
| pollute our web, and then cry about things that don't favor
| you? Boo-hoo.
| [deleted]
| _Microft wrote:
| The web was already polluted. GDPR only removed the
| facade and now you see the ugliness that was behind it.
| chasd00 wrote:
| I honestly think no one wanted to sign with the Trump admin.
| Remember, when the vaccines were being developed and worked
| on everyone was complaining about Trump rushing the vaccines
| and how they weren't going to be safe nor effective. If the
| EU signed on early they would be giving approval to Trump
| before the results were in.
| gaha wrote:
| The EU did the same and they were also the ones funding the
| BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine. But I agree with your other comment
| about the US. The EU should have done the same. Restrict all
| exports to other countries until x million is delivered
| domestically.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| > Why didn't EU do the same?
|
| Germany gave BioNTech 445M. The US didn't give
| Pfizer/BioNTech anything.
| Robotbeat wrote:
| The US did, actually, by placing a firm order for vaccines.
| tempestn wrote:
| So did many other countries. The US is getting those
| doses faster by preventing the Pfizer factories in the US
| from exporting any doses, so they have no choice but to
| sell all of that supply to the US. That's why Canada is
| getting all of the Pfizer/BioNTech doses it purchased
| from the Belgium factory rather than one right across the
| border in the US.
| f6v wrote:
| > The US is getting those doses faster by preventing the
| Pfizer factories in the US from exporting any doses
|
| With democrat president? Who would have thought.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| The order was far from firm, Pfizer would have gotten $0
| from the order if the vaccine didn't pass trials.
| merpnderp wrote:
| Far from firm? If I sign a contract to buy apples from
| you 6 months from now, but you show up with apple seeds,
| was my order not firm if I don't pay you?
|
| The fact is when Pfizer showed up with a vaccine, they
| knew they could sell $2 billion to the US and would have
| legal recourse if the US government didn't pay. That's as
| firm as it gets.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| The participants in operation warp speed get paid whether
| or not their vaccine makes it through trials.
|
| To use your analogy, farmers can sign contracts for "all
| the apples that's produced this year" if they want to
| offload the risk of crop failure rather than a contract
| for a specific number of apples.
| the_why_of_y wrote:
| The EU did sign contracts. Unfortunately AstraZeneca is not
| going to be able to fulfill the contract, only delivering 30m
| out of 80m doses in Q1, with an even bigger shortfall
| expected for Q2.
|
| https://twitter.com/DaveKeating/status/1372897665864830978
| legulere wrote:
| AstraZeneca also exported EU stockpiles to the UK leading
| to this shortfall.
| youngtaff wrote:
| Apparently not many doses have been exported from Halix
| in NL, and they have a stockpile of doses
| markus92 wrote:
| A ton got exported in early January, although precise
| numbers don't seem to be public.
| vinay427 wrote:
| The EU also hadn't approved the vaccine when those
| stockpiles were exported, and it was to compensate for UK
| domestic production shortfalls which the EU suffered from
| a few months later due in large part to the Commission
| delaying the contract. The UK got precedence because they
| were first in line and the EU couldn't yet use the
| vaccines.
| legulere wrote:
| Those were stockpiled for the EU. Meanwhile also the US
| has a stockpile of AstraZeneca vaccines, but none were
| exported.
| _Microft wrote:
| Thanks for linking to this thread, it was insightful.
| bengale wrote:
| But since they were so late in getting that contract signed
| AZ were only able to promise a best effort at delivery.
| bidatzi wrote:
| UK contract is also on a "best effort" basis.
| readittwice wrote:
| True, the EU even waived its right to sue because
| delivery delays.
|
| "And as POLITICO reported last week, the non-redacted
| version of the contract shows that the EU also waived its
| right to sue AstraZeneca in the event of delivery
| delays."
|
| Quote from this article:
| https://www.politico.eu/article/the-key-differences-
| between-...
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| They signed 1 dey before the UK, which also got a 'best
| effort' contract.
| mwaitjmp wrote:
| Have you got a source for this? Would really appreciate
| it.
| bengale wrote:
| https://www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-europe-
| inno...
|
| Here's the CEO of AZ explaining why the three month extra
| time was important.
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/astrazeneca-
| signed-va...
| mwaitjmp wrote:
| The other comment in this chain has the following
| statement in the link posted:
|
| > The UK signed off its deal with AstraZeneca in June
| 2020, three months before the EU did
|
| So I'm not sure what to believe.
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| One is from independent researchers, the other one is
| from AZ press persons.Take your pick.
| [deleted]
| readittwice wrote:
| Again: No, the UK had a binding contract with AZ since
| May already.
|
| "However, the key lies in an earlier agreement that
| AstraZeneca made back in May with the U.K., which was a
| binding deal establishing "the development of a dedicated
| supply chain for the U.K.," an AstraZeneca spokesperson
| said."
|
| Quote is from this article:
| https://www.politico.eu/article/the-key-differences-
| between-...
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| Again: Soriot is lying. This link says the UK signed in
| june : https://www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-
| europe-inno...
|
| Except it didn't, the UK signed in august.
|
| The link also says they wouldn't export EU manufactured
| vaccines, except Italy blocked an export to Australia a
| couple of weeks ago.
| readittwice wrote:
| No, I've already posted the article that states that the
| UK signed the contract with AZ in May. There are also
| other news articles from May 2020
| (https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/18/coronavirus-astrazeneca-
| aims...) that prove that the UK already ordered back
| then.
|
| That's why it was considered "news" when it was reported
| that one particular contract was signed by the UK one day
| after the EU. But that's not the full story, since the UK
| had binding contracts with AZ well before that.
|
| "The link also says they wouldn't export EU manufactured
| vaccines, except Italy blocked an export to Australia a
| couple of weeks ago." I haven't seen that claim in the
| article you linked.
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| "He also denied suggestions that AstraZeneca might be
| selling vaccine doses manufactured in the EU to other
| parts of the world in order to make a bigger profit."
| [deleted]
| readittwice wrote:
| IMHO that sentence doesn't prove your point that "The
| link also says they wouldn't export EU manufactured
| vaccines".
|
| AZ is selling at cost, so they are not making a profit
| from the vaccine atm. So that statement should be
| trivially true.
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| If they are actually selling at cost [citation needed],
| why would they ship to Australia with undoubtedly higher
| transport costs?
| readittwice wrote:
| It is well known that AZ sells the vaccine at cost. E.g.
| "... is being offered by the drugmaker at cost during the
| pandemic and at no profit in perpetuity for low-income
| countries." [1] That's because the vaccine was developed
| by the Oxford university and Oxford made this a
| condition. If AZ makes a profit from the vaccine during
| the pandemic they would break the contract with Oxford.
|
| It seems the cost price differs from country to country
| because of different production costs and other factors
| (maybe shipping).
|
| [1] https://www.politico.eu/article/astrazeneca-vaccine-
| cost-hig...
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| Your link doesn't say anything about signing contracts.
|
| And press releases saying they are ready to go don't
| count as signing contracts.
|
| All your links are rooted in AZ press releases, which
| means nothing.
| readittwice wrote:
| That article was clearly published in May 2020, I don't
| assume AZ sneaked that article in. Are you really saying
| that AZ was faking the press release in May 2020, so that
| in 2021 they could claim that the UK signed the contract
| three months before the EU?
| gebruikersnaam wrote:
| Your article from may doesn't say anything about signing
| contracts, only that they are ready to go.
|
| I've seen the articles mention may, june and august as
| signing dates of the contract, so clearly there is some
| 'miscommunication'. And both the may and june date
| originates from AZ, while the actual date turns out to be
| august.
| readittwice wrote:
| There are plenty of articles from May 2020 that all
| discuss in various words that a deal was struck. If you
| believe that AZ didn't sign a contract with the UK before
| Aug 28 then the burden is on you to prove that.
| bengale wrote:
| Three months before.
| hawk_ wrote:
| what's the point of a contract that's not enforceable? if
| EU has to resort to export bans after the fact, sounds like
| someone somewhere didn't do basic due diligence. companies
| aren't going to deliver just out of the goodness of their
| hearts.
| brmgb wrote:
| > what's the point of a contract that's not enforceable?
|
| That's why the USA didn't bother ordering rapidely. They
| knew they could use the defense act and executive orders
| to block exports and they did as soon as they could. Even
| Canada is buying vaccines in Belgium.
|
| The UK was wise. They prevented Oxford associating with
| Merks and forced them to partner with AstraZeneca. That's
| the key take away from the pfizer debacle and the
| Nordstream interferences. Europe needs to strike American
| companies hard and push them out of the European market
| as fast as possible. The USA is not our ally.
| logotype wrote:
| That's absurd. On the contrary, we should work closer
| with our ally USA, increase trade and more cooperation.
| We should completely decouple from China and stop trade
| from there, and restart domestic manufacturing.
| turbinerneiter wrote:
| To do that, we would need to trust the USA to have our
| shared best interest in mind. I don't have that. The EU
| is notoriously bad in protecting their self-interest, the
| US is notoriously good at that.
|
| I want to the EU to be a close ally to the US, but it is
| not the EU who is the problem here.
| astrange wrote:
| Doesn't Germany have a lot of manufacturing? I thought it
| was what they were known for.
|
| China's final assembly companies are not the only kind of
| manufacturing and not the most worthwhile part of it,
| although Shenzhen is certainly good at electronics.
| jiripospisil wrote:
| You can see some statistics for the Czech Republic (population is
| about 10.7 million) at [0].
|
| Vykazana ockovani celkem = Administered total
|
| Vykazana ockovani za vcera = Administered in the previous day
|
| Osoby s ukoncenym ockovanim (dve davky) celkem = People with
| complete vaccination (two shots) total
|
| Osoby s ukoncenym ockovanim celkem za vcera = People with
| complete vaccination in the previous day
|
| [0] https://onemocneni-aktualne.mzcr.cz/vakcinace-cr
| MayeulC wrote:
| To keep with the thread. France (67M):
| https://dashboard.covid19.data.gouv.fr/suivi-vaccination?loc...
|
| premieres doses = first doses (6.1M)
|
| rendez-vous prevus cette semaine = appointments this week
| (0.5M)
|
| There is a second tab dedicated to logistics:
| https://dashboard.covid19.data.gouv.fr/logistique-vaccins?lo...
|
| That makes it about 10M delivered to date. Vaccination is
| primarily supply-restricted, only the elderly (75+, or 50+ with
| preconditions), and medical/strategic personnel (inc
| firefighters) can get vaccinated for now.
|
| At current pace (last two weeks), it would take ~10 months to
| get 80% vaccinated with one dose... :/
| isbvhodnvemrwvn wrote:
| Poland has this:
|
| https://www.gov.pl/web/szczepimysie/raport-szczepien-przeciw...
|
| Liczba szczepien 1 dawka = first doses administered
|
| Liczba szczepien 2 dawka = second doses administered
|
| Liczba dawek dostarczonych do Polski = doses delivered from
| suppliers
|
| Liczba dawek dostarczonych do punktow = doses delivered to
| vaccination points
|
| Zamowienia w trakcie realizacji = doses assigned to a
| vaccination point, but not yet administered
|
| Stan magazynu = warehouse stock, unclear if this is for second
| doses (methodology changed last week)
|
| Keep in mind that we typically get vaccines on Monday and
| vaccinate throughout the week - yesterday there were ~5k
| available doses in the whole of Poland
| svara wrote:
| This is the wrong thing to complain about. At this point vaccine
| distribution is a zero-sum game. You might just as well frame it
| as "EU refrains from pushing itself to the front of the line".
|
| This thing isn't over before vaccine availability isn't
| production-limited anymore.
|
| The real mistake that the EU made was to not realize early on
| that vaccine production was going to be a huge issue in 2021, and
| make fixing that a priority.
| scrollaway wrote:
| Very untrue. COVID being much, much higher-risk in top age
| brackets means vaccinating the top age brackets everywhere
| _first_ is a lot more beneficial than vaccinating country-by-
| country. Same reason why your country (whichever it is) likely
| made priority groups for vaccine distribution rather than make
| it a free-for-all.
|
| And the first 15-20% or so of vaccines administered are
| CRITICAL. In true pareto principle, 80% of hospitalizations
| come from 20% of the population.
|
| I'm in Belgium. We are facing a third wave. We're going back
| into lockdown pretty soon (it's almost certain). With just 400k
| more vaccines administered, we would not be in this mess.
|
| 400k. The US vaccinates 3 million every day.
| rictic wrote:
| > The US vaccinates 3 million every day.
|
| The US has like 30x as many people as Belgium. A better
| comparison would be Ohio, which has about the population of
| Belgium and is administering ~90k doses per day, which is
| sorta like vaccinating ~60k people a day (based off a guess
| that ~15k doses are the one dose J&J vaccine).
|
| I agree that prioritizing the most vulnerable, regardless of
| nationality is the morally better choice.
| svara wrote:
| The EU has received enough vaccine for everyone over
| 70-something. But it doesn't change anything about whether
| there's a third wave or not.
|
| If you chose not to do a lockdown in the third wave because
| "older people are already vaccinated" that would just mean
| that your hospitals would fill up with younger people
| instead, since total number infected would be much higher
| than ever before.
| markus92 wrote:
| From a public health perspective, it's not zero sum. One
| country fully vaccinated and another equally sized country not
| vaccinated, leads to higher strain on the healthcare system
| than both countries 50% vaccinated. Pareto principle applies to
| hospitalizations.
| klelatti wrote:
| Leaving aside the politics is anyone surprised that roll-out has
| been slower when organised (to a material extent) by a
| multinational organisation whose normal modus operandi is to
| build consensus amongst its members even if this takes time (I've
| experienced it at first hand).
|
| Contrast this with the UK which has a very centralised governance
| model and a centralised single payer health system.
|
| Not being critical of or praising either model or behaviour in
| either case. Just not surprising that this happens when the
| challenge is to deliver on a clear objective as rapidly as
| possible.
|
| (And still disappointing that EU citizens have to deal with the
| results of this).
| polytely wrote:
| I really wish this graph included individual EU countries because
| the vaccination strategy is specific per country
| blibble wrote:
| the only countries doing well are those that have stepped
| outside of the EU commission's bungled programme
| pacificmint wrote:
| A lot of the European countries are all at a similiar point,
| most likely cause the vaccines were procured together. Spain,
| Italy, France and Germany are virtually identical, on a per
| capita basis.
|
| Hungary is a little ahead, as they are also using the Russian
| vaccine. But still behind the US.
| FpUser wrote:
| Italian company Adienne Pharma & Biotech has signed the deal
| to produce Russian vaccine domestically. They are waiting
| however for the approval of said vaccine by the EU.
| buster wrote:
| I think the EU is ordering and distributing the vaccines for
| the member states in order to do it even and fair (not sure how
| this works out in reality, though).
| SiempreViernes wrote:
| They coordinate purchases and deliveries at a national level
| only. It's a very long way down from a truck leaving the
| factory destined towards a country and someone getting
| stabbed in the arm by a professional, and _all_ of that work
| is on the national agencies.
| generaljelly wrote:
| I agree. I would love to know the specifics of any country in
| detail. Or a least a deeper understanding of medicine
| distribution in the EU. Any chance someome can explain and talk
| about it?
| odiroot wrote:
| Well, Hungary is in EU and they seem to be doing much better than
| the rest.
| raverbashing wrote:
| They are going with Chinese and Russian vaccines (and for a
| 10Mi country a small number will bump the per capita numbers
| nicely)
|
| Not a bad strategy but it doesn't scale (especially for the
| Sputnik V current production capability)
| yosito wrote:
| Hungary decided to bypass EU regulators and approve several
| vaccines that aren't approved in the EU, as well as procure
| them with their own deals.
| the_mitsuhiko wrote:
| You don't need to bypass regulators, all countries can
| approve it themselves. That's also how the UK approved their
| vaccines before the Brexit deal took effect.
| the-dude wrote:
| There is no need to bypass the EU regulators as each EU
| country has its own regulatory body which has national
| authority.
|
| The EU is a trade-bloc, full stop. The EMA is there to make
| it easier for pharma.
| standardUser wrote:
| Most of Europe was much slower to approve vaccines than the US
| and UK. Because of that, I've assumed since the first approvals
| in December that Europe would lag. Once the US, UK and others
| said "hey, we're ready to buy all the vaccines, send us what
| you'e got", what did we expect would happen? I don't know why
| Europe lagged on the approvals, but it seems obvious that would
| also lead to a lag in rollout.
| derriz wrote:
| The FDA has yet to approve AstraZeneca's vaccine while the EU
| approved it back in January. The US has a stockpile of
| 40million doses which are not being used until approval arrives
| while European vaccination rates are limited by vaccine supply.
|
| Approval speed has nothing to do with it.
| readittwice wrote:
| I agree with that. However, Martin Selmayr (Secretary-General
| of the European Commission) recently explained on TV that the
| slower approval was the reason that the EU is lagging behind
| the US in vaccations. Well, obviously that slower approval
| was for "more safety" according to him.
|
| That explanation doesn't make a whole lot of sense since the
| delay was only a few weeks for Biontech/Pfizer or Moderna. As
| you mentioned, AZ is not even approved in the US. Europe
| would need to vaccinate around 50M people in a few weeks.
|
| EU politicans know that the EU has failed at procurement.
| They now try to cover that up by blaming AZ and explaining
| delays with additional safety measures.
| pvitz wrote:
| Selmayr hasn't been the Secretary-General of COM for two
| years.
| readittwice wrote:
| Oh right, that's true. Sorry. He is now still a European
| civil servant though. In my defense, I quickly googled
| his name and that's what popped out first. On TV was
| announced as "spokesperson of the European Commission",
| so I thought that was his official job title.
| tabtab wrote:
| The US should allow AstraZeneca to be used on volunteers in
| other nations, as long as it's not under coercion. The
| possible blot-clot issue is small, if any. Thus, volunteers
| is a decent compromise, rather than let it sit in storage.
| bobbylarrybobby wrote:
| The US is currently shipping AZ to Canada and Mexico
| raducu wrote:
| Please, stop with this bullshit.
|
| The USA and UK are not exporting any vaccines, the EU is
| exporting vaccines, the EU is the good guy here, the EU has
| every right to ban vaccines exports like the USA, but it
| doesn't do that.
|
| That's the bottom line, not some obscure contract bullshit.
| Contracts don't matter if a soverign entity like the USA ban
| vaccine exportations.
|
| Do you think we're all dumb and can fool us not to recognize a
| sparrow when we see one?
|
| History will judge fat americans rushing to the lifeboats
| before foreign "women and children", it's disgusting and should
| be ashamed of yourself.
| kitd wrote:
| Just FYI, the UK exports components of the Pfizer vaccine to
| the EU.
|
| It's way more nuanced than you paint it.
| libertine wrote:
| I don't get this argument.
|
| There's countries all over the globe exporting components
| for vaccines. Canada, all over Europe, it's a global chain.
| dundarious wrote:
| I find the information in
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26544947 credible, and
| they indicate that approval is not the major issue. Instead,
| the EU's contracts with the pharma companies cannot be met,
| because the US and UK legislated/contracted to bind local
| production to local use, with the UK even specifically
| requiring/strongly encouraging Oxford to use a UK pharma
| company (instead of a US one) in order to ensure they could
| bind local production to local use.
| mytailorisrich wrote:
| The UK (and the US) used emergency provisions to grant
| temporary approvals early. The EU pretty much followed the
| normal procedure but is an accelerated schedule.
|
| The EU branded the UK's emergency approval "reckless".
| mahkeiro wrote:
| Really AZ vaccine is not even approved in the USA...
| junippor wrote:
| CTRL-F bureaucracy
|
| Cue HN complaining how much "bureaucracy" and how much "red tape"
| the EU has, and smth smth socialism.
| CodeGlitch wrote:
| But that is the problem here isn't it? Why else would the EU be
| 3 months behind the UK.
| the_why_of_y wrote:
| The EU appears to be of the opinion that it needs to net
| export 8 million vaccine doses a month to the UK (plus 17
| million to other countries, although the article doesn't
| detail if any doses are imported from those countries).
|
| https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/eu-exported-
| mor...
| SiempreViernes wrote:
| There are two issues: UK and US nationalism preventing
| companies to shift finished products _to_ the EU in case of
| production troubles, while the EU has been slow to impose
| restrictions in the other ways. This meant that when the AZ
| plant in Belgium got production problems the EU had to take
| the shortfall alone instead of it being distributed on all
| customers: the upshot of this is that UK has simply gotten
| more vaccines than the EU.
|
| The second problem is largely national: some countries have
| been slow to use the severely reduced deliveries they have
| gotten (possibly because their schedules were screwed up by
| the shortfall). The national governments have been _really_
| happy to pretend the national programs are perfect and there
| aren 't large stockpiles of unused vaccines in their
| countries, and to blame all the tardiness on the shortfall
| "from the EU".
| mattmanser wrote:
| Nationalism? The Astrazeneca vaccines was paid for by the
| UK 3 months before the EU.
|
| Not 3 weeks, 3 months.
|
| The same production problems with the EU batch happened to
| the UK one, as far as I know, but they had time to fix it
| because of those extra 3 months.
|
| Now the EU want to jump the queue and give it out "evenly",
| because it suits them. And if the shoe was on the other
| foot, they'd be saying 'je suis desole, we have no vaccine
| for you British because of Brexit'. And you know it.
|
| Plus they've been talking down the British strategy so much
| now their own citizens are wasting what Astrazeneca
| supplies they do have, so it'd be a complete waste.
| dundarious wrote:
| No that's probably not the problem, if this (plausible)
| thread is accurate:
| https://twitter.com/DaveKeating/status/1372897635577761803
|
| Edit: I'm not sure I buy the proposed argument that in a way,
| "the EU believed in the free market and fair play too much,
| and the US and UK betrayed those noble ideals", but I do
| believe the EU failed to recognize and/or counter the state
| of play, that the US and UK had legislated production
| partners and output to stay within national borders.
| tinus_hn wrote:
| I think the EU even today is still boasting about how they
| saved a few euros on the vaccines. Such an great deal, when
| someone else pays for the consequences.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| I'll just note that without any factories of their own, Israel
| managed to get more vaccines than any other country.
|
| As I understand it, because they were ready to pay whatever it
| costs. Which, if you look at the numbers, is not much at all.
| onlyrealcuzzo wrote:
| The UAE is also up to 80%.
|
| Having a population of 8M helps a lot.
|
| If Israel (or the UAE) had a population of 350M - they would
| not be even close to 100% vaccinated.
| atilaneves wrote:
| Switzerland has a population of 8.6M, isn't part of the EU,
| and yet...
|
| The problem there has been getting enough doses delivered.
| Voloskaya wrote:
| > As I understand it, because they were ready to pay whatever
| it costs.
|
| That particular cost wasn't financial though. It was a promise
| to fast track rollout where other countries wanted to go
| through lengthy approval and review processes, vaccinate their
| population as fast as possible and share data about efficacy
| with the manufacturers. The Israeali government was ready to
| take risks that many other countries weren't.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| Interesting! I didn't know that!
|
| I found an article confirming this. Though it also says
|
| > _" Israel paid about $30 per dose, almost double what other
| nations did"_
|
| I'm always shocked by how little money that is. $3000 per
| dose would be cheap!!!
|
| https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2021/01/05/the-
| secre...
| phtrivier wrote:
| Headline could have read : "player that manufacture, use and
| export resource lags behind players that manufacture, use, and
| don't export resource".
|
| A terrible twitter threat summarized this as "UE played expecting
| fair play. This now looks naive."
|
| https://mobile.twitter.com/DaveKeating/status/13728976355777...
|
| I love bitching at my government like every one else, but it
| can't see what logistics you can improve to vaccinate more people
| when you don't exactly have vaccines.
|
| Oh, and great play by FB to make sure no one below 30 in europe
| wants a vaccine, you played well for team USA on this one !
|
| I suppose this will serve as a "never again" shock for bringing
| back some factories in the EU. Or it will simply serve as a
| stepping stone for nationalist who will just make things a tad
| worse, before it (maybe) (one hopes) (who knows ?) gets better.
| strictnein wrote:
| Always like when Twitter threads that are supposed to be
| sources of "truth" says stuff like this:
|
| > "Meanwhile in March 2020, President Trump tried
| unsuccessfully to steal BioNTech from Germany"
|
| They tried to buy the company. Not sure when "Buy" became
| "Steal"
|
| > "Trump seemed to be in no hurry to sign Pfizer purchase
| contracts. "
|
| He then links to an article about how they weren't rushing to
| buy additional vaccines on top of the 100 million already
| purchased. So, again, highly misleading. Not buying additional
| vaccines just became "in no hurry to sign Pfizer purchase
| contracts"
| raverbashing wrote:
| "Severely lags behind" well, only if we're considering the top
| performers
|
| Countries that are ahead of the EU (on avg.) per person doses are
| mostly small (Israel, UAE, Chile). Comparable are the UK, US and
| China
|
| In terms of actual doses the EU is behind the US and maybe China
| (debatable numbers).
|
| The rest are behind
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explor...
| 2trill2spill wrote:
| According to the Bloomberg tracker[1] the United states has
| given 24.9% of the population at least one shot and 13.5% two
| shots. The EU has given 8.7% one dose and 3.8% two doses. The
| United States is administrating 2.5 million doses a day and the
| EU is administrating 1.1 million doses a day, although the EU
| has a larger population. Also the rate of vaccines administered
| in the EU is down from 1.5 million a day from the prior week,
| while the US rate is going up. So severely behind seems about
| right.
|
| [1]: https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covid-vaccine-tracker-
| glo...
| raverbashing wrote:
| "Severely behind" the country doing the most vaccinations per
| day, but not on a general comparison. (Though yes last week
| the amount given was lower)
|
| I completely agree the EU could be doing a better job, but in
| terms of general comparison, it's not doing bad
|
| (It's doing better than Canada/Australia/Japan) for example.
| thehappypm wrote:
| No, it's doing bad.
|
| Canada should, by all means, be doing much worse than the
| EU, being a politically low-power country. Being roughly
| the same as the EU is bad.
|
| Australia basically has eradicated covid.
|
| Japan has the pandemic largely under control as well.
|
| The EU, for all its socialism and condescension of the US,
| should by all means be clobbering the US. But it's getting
| clobbered.
| FpUser wrote:
| >"The EU, for all its socialism and condescension of the
| US, should by all means be clobbering the US. But it's
| getting clobbered."
|
| The US has never lacked the decisiveness and the ability
| to mobilize.
| astrange wrote:
| The US lacks decisiveness ("you can always trust the
| Americans to do the right thing after all other options
| are exhausted" etc) but has the ability to mobilize
| (state capacity). We're just only good at one thing - war
| metaphors.
|
| So we can't keep a lockdown going because that's not a
| war. But we can do vaccines great, that's just
| metaphorically shooting people.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > The US has never lacked the decisiveness and the
| ability to mobilize.
|
| It's dithering in both World Wars (among many, many other
| examples) would lead many people to question the
| decisiveness side of that.
| FpUser wrote:
| Not sure about WWI events but from what I understand WWII
| did not pose immediate danger to the US and there was no
| pressing need for them to decide. From what I understand
| they were even happy to trade with the Germany. Once
| Pearl Harbor happened it changed the picture.
| Mvandenbergh wrote:
| Behind whom?
|
| I mean, I get it, my own country is doing badly even compared to
| other EU countries but we need to keep in mind that the EU is at
| 10% or so vaccinated which is a lot more than almost any other
| major country or political bloc.
|
| If you show only the UK and US as comparators, it looks really
| bad but that's a hard comparison set to go up against.
|
| It's actually really ironic that the the UK and US took an
| approach that most people would consider a very European one by
| directly involving themselves and investing up-front in vaccine
| production while the European Commission took the neoliberal
| route of placing commercial orders in most cases and doing some
| but much less direct investment.
|
| What has ended up happening is basically the confluence of
| suboptimal but not necessarily bad decision making and some
| really bad luck.
|
| The EU, UK, and US all bought large portfolios of vaccines,
| enough a few times over if they all worked. They also all
| invested up-front in R&D, the EU proportionally less per head of
| population but of course many EU countries are not so rich and do
| not have so much domestic biotech/pharma so this has to be seen
| in that context as well. The EU is not all France/Benelux/Germany
| which do have such industries.
|
| All three gambled that their portfolios would pay off.
|
| US went heavy on J&J, Pfizer/Biontech, Moderna (not as sure about
| the US portfolio but loads of others) UK went for AZ, Valneva,
| GSK/Sanofi, Novavax, Pfizer/Biontech, (and later bought some
| Moderna but not much and only after it was approved). There is
| some kind of future agreement with CureVac which was only
| recently concluded. EU went for Pfizer-Biontech, AZ, J&J
| GSK/Sanofi, CureVac, Moderna. I think there have been discussions
| with Novavax and Valneva but no concrete orders.
|
| (UK and EU have the vaccines roughly in order of order size)
|
| So what happened?
|
| Essentially the Pfizer vaccine worked brilliantly and they seem
| to have gotten their scale-up working quite well. Good for EU and
| UK both.
|
| AZ works well (probably slightly less well, and with quite a lot
| of evidence that the decision not to use the stabilised fusion
| protein is what is making a difference to performance against
| certain variants) but AZ is having an absolute nightmare getting
| their yields up. This has affected all their global production -
| they had intended to delivery 30m doses to the UK by September...
| 2020 and 100m by the end of the year and clearly have not been
| able to. Making biological products is really hard, clearly. This
| has slowed down both the UK and EU roll-outs but because the UK
| scale-up started earlier (note my comments above about investment
| agreements, they started production scaling at their Oxford site
| as early as April 2020) they are further in the production ramp
| and of course most of the UK delay was before the vaccine was
| approved. So despite their UK order technically being later than
| their EU order, it has been felt much harder in the EU because
| the "lateness" of the UK order mostly happened before the vaccine
| (or any other vaccine) was approved.
|
| The GSK/Sanofi vaccine has been postponed and may never see the
| light of day.
|
| Novavax has had good results and is currently preparing for the
| approval process.
|
| Both the UK and EU had hoped to use either AZ or GSK/Sanofi as
| their "workhorse" vaccine but the UK had slightly less emphasis
| on it and bought / invested in more doses of vaccine per head.
| The EU has not done a great job here but it's also not abject
| failure, they've just had some bad luck in that simultaneously
| their two biggest orders were cancelled and slowed down.
|
| It could easily have been the case that a different set of
| vaccines didn't work and/or were hard to make and then it might
| be the US or the UK with the problem.
|
| I think before we draw big picture conclusions (apart from Ursula
| vdL being useless, but I think any German who remembered how good
| she was at defence procurement could have told you that) we need
| to remember that to some extent there are historical
| contingencies at play here and we can end up over-fitting by
| assuming that literally every difference we see is due to
| structural problems/advantages faced by one side or another.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-03-22 23:00 UTC)