What exactly is happening with AstraZeneca?

...Ghost... · 30-01-2021 11:14AM

Some curious developments have taken place since yesterday. So an EU diplomat knee jerks with an article 16 declaration which was (at this time) rightfully withdrawn by Von Der Leyen. But lets look at why it even got that far.

It would seem that the EU are now certain that the UK has effectively been siphoning the EU doses by using underhanded at best, criminally at worst practices. Many millions of doses of stockpiled vaccine ear marked for the EU were secretly shipped to the UK to make Boris look good and the EU look bad.

A full and independent investigation will uncover the whole truth, but in my view, the EU have managed to remain very composed as a whole under the circumstances. Imagine having to have a civil conversation with the very person who is making underhand deals which are costing lives in the EU. The UK are not exactly being good neighbours. Funny watching Arlene Foster calling the EU hostile at the mention of article 16 when her government helped load the lorries full of stolen vaccines from EU warehouses days before the EU were going to start rolling the vaccines out.

jackboy · 30-01-2021 11:24AM

...Ghost... wrote: »

The UK are not exactly being good neighbours. Funny watching Arlene Foster calling the EU hostile at the mention of article 16 when her government helped load the lorries full of stolen vaccines from EU warehouses days before the EU were going to start rolling the vaccines out.

That’s just given me an image of Arlene driving a forklift loading a truck with stolen vaccines.

Anyway, I have no doubt the Brits are capable of shenanigans regarding the vaccines but the article 16 stuff was a massive own goal.

30-01-2021 11:25AM

Deleted User wrote: »

The same Macron who is questioning the UK's role as an ally.

The same Macron and Merkel who question the safety of the AstraZeneca vaccine given its roots to Oxford.

It's all the same cynical politics - rooted in anti-Brexit envy and hysteria. The only difference is that I can see it from both sides, whereas you appear to be wearing 1-inch thick rose-tinted glasses that somehow everything EU forces do/says must always be made bona fide.

For the benefit of other posters it should be noted that around 95% of this posters total contributions to this forum since joining have been UK centric and he/she has displayed enmity to the E.U. throughout.

engage at your peril. Moderation policy would generally be to attack the post and not the poster but this poster doesn't care one jot about the health and welfare of the aged and vulnerable in the E.U. or for example your Grandparents isolated from their families here in Ireland where most of you reside. This poster just wants to undermine the E.U. as his allegiances are to Mother England. That Eskimohunt seeks to exploit a public health emergency to further their own political views just goes to show how despicable a person they are.

listermint · 30-01-2021 11:27AM

...Ghost... wrote: »

Some curious developments have taken place since yesterday. So an EU diplomat knee jerks with an article 16 declaration which was (at this time) rightfully withdrawn by Von Der Leyen. But lets look at why it even got that far.

It would seem that the EU are now certain that the UK has effectively been siphoning the EU doses by using underhanded at best, criminally at worst practices. Many millions of doses of stockpiled vaccine ear marked for the EU were secretly shipped to the UK to make Boris look good and the EU look bad.

A full and independent investigation will uncover the whole truth, but in my view, the EU have managed to remain very composed as a whole under the circumstances. Imagine having to have a civil conversation with the very person who is making underhand deals which are costing lives in the EU. The UK are not exactly being good neighbours. Funny watching Arlene Foster calling the EU hostile at the mention of article 16 when her government helped load the lorries full of stolen vaccines from EU warehouses days before the EU were going to start rolling the vaccines out.

Any details on this ? Can't find anything online

lucernarian · 30-01-2021 11:27AM

Carfacemandog wrote: »

Stupid move from the EU to do this, but it's absolutely gas watching the usual crowd on social media etc trying to claim "dictatorship towards its members!" and only for the EU backtracked within 12 hours of a country comprising of 1.1% of its total population expressing severe dissatisfaction with the move.

To see some still trying this one after said backtrack is... not surprising. :pac:

This seems to be arguing both sides of the point. Someone in the EU commission made a stupid move, either the criticism is justifiably severe or "the usual crowd is at it again". I'm not all that sure yet if it was a stupid move, I'm in the biology field, not law or trade issues.

The fact it was even publicly suggested does not reflect well on the EU in this instance it appears going by the level of reaction from political leaders of all sides here. Maybe people can be pissed off without being labelled Tories or "anti-EU"?

ThePanjandrum · 30-01-2021 11:28AM

This comes from Fierce Pharma, Nov 5, 2020, apparently based on a Reuters report:

AstraZeneca missed a September deadline for its COVID-19 vaccine in the U.K., and it's going to deliver far fewer doses than promised by year-end. But CEO Pascal Soriot says delays in its clinical trial prompted the company to hold off manufacturing.

Instead of 30 million doses of AZD1222, the U.K. will only receive 4 million this year, Vaccine Taskforce Chair Kate Bingham said, as reported by Reuters.

“The predictions that were made in good faith at the time were assuming that absolutely everything would work and that there were no hiccups at all,” Bingham told lawmakers, as quoted by the news service, referring to a supply deal AZ signed with the U.K. government in May.

I don't remember people moaning then but presumably, the EU was also aware of this as it was in the public domain. Another interesting snippet from there is that the vaccine is not put through the finishing process until clinical authorisation is received because raising the temperature for the process reduces the shelf life. So it can be expected that it is only now that the EU's order will be put in vials and distributed. It also raises the question of what AstraZeneca would do before authorisation. Probably if it was able to move to full production it would rapidly fill the available cold storage and have to cease production.

BTW, on the question of the UK ordering delivery of substantial quantities of the vaccine to be delivered before the date, it was authorised, trials were delayed by a month because of the illness of a trial participant so it would have been expected that authorisation would also be in place a month earlier.

ThePanjandrum · 30-01-2021 11:32AM

micosoft wrote: »

Further evidence is that the restrictions only apply to rich countries with vaccine production capabilities and specifically excludes 100+ nations in Africa and elsewhere.

Seeing that the poorer countries of Africa and Asia are supplied from the Indian plant this is not really surprising.

astrofool · 30-01-2021 11:54AM

Deleted User wrote: »

The same Macron who is questioning the UK's role as an ally.

The same Macron and Merkel who question the safety of the AstraZeneca vaccine given its roots to Oxford.

It's all the same cynical politics - rooted in anti-Brexit envy and hysteria. The only difference is that I can see it from both sides, whereas you appear to be wearing 1-inch thick rose-tinted glasses that somehow everything EU forces do/says must always be made bona fide.

I don't think anyone is calling into question the credentials of those in Oxford who have done brilliant work.

suicide_circus · 30-01-2021 12:14PM

The WHO critical of the EU's actions;

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55860540

FileNotFound · 30-01-2021 12:21PM

suicide_circus wrote: »

The WHO critical of the EU's actions;

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55860540

Did they do anything or just talk about it?

I understood it was nothing more than a proposal and in actuality nothing was triggered.

Anyone know the facts on this.

brickster69 · 30-01-2021 12:21PM

Probably makes sense for Astrazeneca AB to sign the contracts with it being headquartered in Sweden and any disputes settled in an EU members courts.

We don't have details on which entity the Oxford agreement was with yet but you would imagine it would be Astrazeneca UK Ltd and signed under UK Contract law.

Wockhardt Ltd( UK ) also signed direct with the UK Government as opposed to the Indian one.

https://www.pharmiweb.com/press-release/2020-08-10/wockhardt-announces-covid-19-vaccine-partnership-with-uk-government

30-01-2021 12:21PM

Deleted User wrote: »

For the benefit of other posters it should be noted that around 95% of this posters total contributions to this forum since joining have been UK centric and he/she has displayed enmity to the E.U. throughout.

I am fully entitled to the views I hold, however much you and others may disagree with them.

There has been a lot of misrepresentation going on regarding how the EU has acted over the past week.

Daniel Hannan, in his latest irrefutable contribution to the Telegraph, sets out precisely the parameters of how appallingly the EU has behaved.

Let’s start with the bare facts. Brussels is in dispute with AstraZeneca, the British-Swedish pharmaceutical company, over the late delivery of some Covid vaccines. For what it’s worth, the EU seems to have a staggeringly weak case. It published its contract with the firm but, far from being any kind of “gotcha”, that contract showed that AstraZeneca had simply promised to use its “reasonable best efforts” to fulfil the order, the same form of words it used with the UK, which also saw some late deliveries. The rights and wrongs of that dispute, though, are beside the point. The EU’s quarrel is with AstraZeneca, not with Britain.

In pursuit of its quarrel, Brussels announced plans to block the export of vaccines from a completely unrelated company, the American corporation Pfizer, to Britain – vaccines which no one disputed that the UK had purchased, and on which the EU did not pretend to have any legal claim.

In other words, Brussels was threatening to halt the sale of life-saving drugs to a neighbouring country, not in response to any provocation, but simply because it was cross that that country was further advanced in its vaccination programme.

It gets worse. In order to deflect criticism from its hopeless record in ordering vaccines, the European Commission aimed its law expressly at Britain. Its export ban did not apply to other neighbouring states, such as Iceland, Morocco, Egypt, Syria, Ukraine or Belarus. The only country in the vicinity to be targeted was the UK.

It gets worse still. To make sure that no vaccines could enter the UK, the Commission announced that it was excluding Northern Ireland from the single market arrangements which it had previously insisted were so critical to the peace process. Incredibly, it didn’t notify Britain or Ireland in advance, and its move united every party in Dublin and Belfast against it (as well, for that matter, as every party at Westminster except the SNP), eventually forcing it to back down. Still, a point was made – a point that cannot now be unmade. For four years, EU negotiators claimed that the merest possibility of a border in Ireland would risk a return to terrorism, and worked to convince the world that this was a risk that Britain was somehow prepared to run. Yet it took precisely 29 days before the EU itself announced such a border.

It gets even worse than that. Annoyed at Britain’s success, European leaders started casting doubt on the efficacy of the AstraZeneca product. Engaging in the kind of nuttiness which gets people banned from social media, Emmanuel Macron claimed that the vaccine “didn’t work”. In other words, the EU is breaking every norm of civilised behaviour and threatening expropriation over a vaccine which, from sheer sour grapes, its leaders claim is ineffective.

Let’s summarise. The European Commission elbowed aside its member states, which had begun their own procurement programmes, and insisted on negotiating en bloc for the 27. It moved slowly and bureaucratically, reportedly because it was holding out for vaccines produced by Continental firms. In the end, three months after Britain, it signed a contract with AstraZeneca similar to that which some of its nations had tried to sign earlier. As criticism mounted, it panicked and lashed out – smashing the principles of due process, private property and free trade in the process.

How anyone can, in this light, justify or defend the actions of the EU, is beyond my comprehension.

...Ghost... · 30-01-2021 12:31PM

listermint wrote: »

Any details on this ? Can't find anything online

Actually the bulk was on RTE news, which has magically been updated to exclude a lot of the details published a few hours ago. Odd that.

I don't keep a list of links I have visited to garner details if i'm just browsing on the mobile in the morning. I haven't used twitter or Wikipedia as a source though.

It's a shame the video of Arlene Foster driving a forktruck with a pallet of vaccines at 3am down the autobahn has been removed too.

30-01-2021 12:36PM

Deleted User wrote: »

I am fully entitled to the views I hold, however much you and others may disagree with them.

You don't give a damn if the family and friends of people frequenting this forum who are at risk die gasping for breath as a result of subjects of her Majesty who aren't in risk groups receiving immunization months earlier than they otherwise would have.
You shamefully persist with your anti-E.U. diatribe and in that respect you are an exceptional person.

listermint · 30-01-2021 12:50PM

[Deleted User] wrote: »

I am fully entitled to the views I hold, however much you and others may disagree with them.

There has been a lot of misrepresentation going on regarding how the EU has acted over the past week.

Daniel Hannan, in his latest irrefutable contribution to the Telegraph, sets out precisely the parameters of how appallingly the EU has behaved.

How anyone can, in this light, justify or defend the actions of the EU, is beyond my comprehension.

To be fundamentally clear. Daniel Hannan is not a reliable source on anything whatsoever. And using an article produced by him is worthless.

Just for full clarity.

30-01-2021 12:50PM

Deleted User wrote: »

You don't give a damn if the family and friends of people frequenting this forum who are at risk die gasping for breath as a result of subjects of her Majesty who aren't in risk groups receiving immunization months earlier than they otherwise would have.
You shamefully persist with your anti-E.U. diatribe and in that respect you are an exceptional person.

If you cared to read what Daniel Hannan penciled into his latest Telegraph column, you'd learn that it is the EU who is attempting to limit vaccine supply to patients in the United Kingdom - and baselessly so.

The EU’s quarrel is with AstraZeneca, not with Britain.

In pursuit of its quarrel, Brussels announced plans to block the export of vaccines from a completely unrelated company, the American corporation Pfizer, to Britain – vaccines which no one disputed that the UK had purchased, and on which the EU did not pretend to have any legal claim.

In other words, Brussels was threatening to halt the sale of life-saving drugs to a neighbouring country, not in response to any provocation, but simply because it was cross that that country was further advanced in its vaccination programme.

listermint · 30-01-2021 12:51PM

[Deleted User] wrote: »

If you cared to read what Daniel Hannan penciled in his latest Telegraph column, you'd learn that it is the EU who is attempting to limit vaccine supply to patients in the United Kingdom - and baselessly so.

Also I may further note it's high time UK ministers were prevented from earning second salaries moonlighting as journalists, columnists, radio presenters or whatever else they do to platform nonsense.

30-01-2021 12:54PM

listermint wrote: »

To be fundamentally clear. Daniel Hannan is not a reliable source on anything whatsoever. And using an article produced by him is worthless.

Just for full clarity.

You cannot casually dismiss his points.

By all means shoot the messenger, but his points still stand.

You have to demonstrate that his points are wrong. From my analysis of his article, I fail to find one - not one error.

On your ancillary point re: ministers and second salaries, I agree.

30-01-2021 12:56PM

Deleted User wrote: »

you'd learn that it is the EU who is attempting to limit vaccine supply to patients in the United Kingdom - and baselessly so.

The UK have already given out 6 million immunization shots so are well ahead of Ireland in covering their "at risk" population.
What the UK are doing is prioritising their healthier population at the expense of those in risk throughout the rest of the Europe and beyond.
I don't think you even know how to approach this topic honestly because you have been engaging in pro UK jingoism for so long.

PCeeeee · 30-01-2021 12:57PM

Deleted User wrote: »

I am fully entitled to the views I hold, however much you and others may disagree with them.

There has been a lot of misrepresentation going on regarding how the EU has acted over the past week.

Daniel Hannan, in his latest irrefutable contribution to the Telegraph, sets out precisely the parameters of how appallingly the EU has behaved.

How anyone can, in this light, justify or defend the actions of the EU, is beyond my comprehension.

You're absolutely right. If this was my only source on the subject I could not justify or defend the actions of the EU.

It's not though:D

30-01-2021 12:59PM

Deleted User wrote: »

The UK have already given out 6 million immunization shots so are well ahead of Ireland in covering their "at risk" population.
What the UK are doing is prioritising their healthier population at the expense of those in risk throughout the rest of the Europe and beyond.
I don't think you even know how to approach this topic honestly because you have been engaging in pro UK jingoism for so long.

Each country is duty-bound to protect their own populations.

That's the nature of the nation-state.

The EU is effectively a pan-European nation - however, it has acted poorly in its attempt to procure vaccines, not least due to the endlessly grinding bureaucracy that forms the heart of this political entity.

For the EU to turn its artillery on the UK - and the UK alone - as grounds to prevent contracted vaccines from being delivered, is a stain on the EU that cannot now be undone.

30-01-2021 01:02PM

Deleted User wrote: »

Each country is duty-bound to protect their own populations.

...ethically, but that isn't something that you'd understand or appreciate.

30-01-2021 01:04PM

Deleted User wrote: »

...ethically, but that isn't something that you'd understand or appreciate.

Why did the EU not turn its attention to Israel, when Israel had already protected the most vulnerable? Why didn't the EU demand that excess vaccines be distributed to other countries whose illest needed to be vaccinated?

Why should the UK be singled out and targeted in this way?

Deep down, we both know the answer to that question.

FileNotFound · 30-01-2021 01:04PM

[Deleted User] wrote: »

You cannot casually dismiss his points.

By all means shoot the messenger, but his points still stand.

You have to demonstrate that his points are wrong. From my analysis of his article, I fail to find one - not one error.

On your ancillary point re: ministers and second salaries, I agree.

I understand that the limiting of vaccine sales was a proposal and no more. Given the UKs past at proposing nonsense to push negotiations how could you take umbrage with that.

If it was even submitted you will be able to find and show us a copy. Best I know it never went further than talk.

You keep quoting a biased non fact article. As you can see the average reader here has some education (poor undereducated UK might fall for the rubbish). Maybe try some solid basis.

EU approach was fine. Big machines move slower but it will work out fine.

As a market the UK is larger than many in the EU. So banding together is good.

Even if the EU did decide to hold all vaccines made here, guess they can only do that as they had the foresight to ensure control over production.

Another thing the brexit dope didn't spot.

And let's be fair, the EU is hard to wind up, maybe there is more than meets the eye.

AZ might not survive this mess.

30-01-2021 01:07PM

Deleted User wrote: »

Why did the EU not turn its attention to Israel, when Israel had already protected the most vulnerable? Why didn't the EU demand that excess vaccines be distributed to other countries whose illest needed to be vaccinated?

Why should the UK be singled out and targeted in this way?

Deep down, we both know the answer to that question.

We all know that the Pharmaceutical company has been coerced to divert product intended for E.U. people at risk to the UK.

30-01-2021 01:10PM

Deleted User wrote: »

We all know that the Pharmaceutical company has been coerced to divert product intended for E.U. people at risk to the UK.

You are confusing two different things.

The EU has a personal problem with AstraZeneca over contract etc.

But the EU has proposed banning exports of the Pfizer vaccine to the UK (as they are manufactured in Belgium) to which the EU had no legal basis in acquiring whatsoever.

The EU has no right to be acting in such a flagrantly nationalistic, belligerent, and hostile manner.

30-01-2021 01:14PM

Deleted User wrote: »

You are confusing two different things.

The EU has a personal problem with AstraZeneca over contract etc.

The E.U. has a problem with AstraZeneca having being coerced by the UK to dirvert product which the E.U. paid to develop and produce. It is a low point in the recent history of the U.K. but when one thinks that one has witnessed the nadir of their depravity they surpass themselves.
The behaviour of the UK government and their Apologists is unforgivable.

wexfordman2 · 30-01-2021 01:15PM

Deleted User wrote: »

If you cared to read what Daniel Hannan penciled into his latest Telegraph column, you'd learn that it is the EU who is attempting to limit vaccine supply to patients in the United Kingdom - and baselessly so.

In other words, Brussels was threatening to halt the sale of life-saving drugs to a neighbouring country, not in response to any provocation, but simply because it was cross that that country was further advanced in its vaccination programme.

Could you educate me and point to what specific action the eu took to block the exports of vaccines from the eu to any country ? Including ones not made by AZ as claimed in your post above.

30-01-2021 01:21PM

wexfordman2 wrote: »

Could you educate me and point to what specific action the eu took to block the exports of vaccines from the eu to any country ? Including ones not made by AZ as claimed in your post above.

Under the new rule made pregnant by the EU, pharmaceutical companies will have to seek permission before supplying doses beyond the EU. Its 27 member states will be able to vet those export applications.

This is the very definition of vaccine nationalism. Withholding vaccines for oneself.

In fact, the former Prime Minister of Sweden, Carl Bildt, commented that he "had hoped not to see the EU leading the world down the destructive path of vaccine nationalism".

The WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, commented that the EU's newly introduced regulation to implement vaccine nationalism would cause a "protracted recovery" from the pandemic.

This isn't the UK acting as nationalists; it's the EU - and forces hitherto aligned with the EU are now some of its most vocal critics.

30-01-2021 01:22PM

End effect is 150,000 "at risk" and key personnel in Ireland don't receive vaccination and every day they are not immunized they are risk all at a time when the variants of the virus which are in circulation are even more contagious than in the past:
"The Taoiseach warned that the Republic could also lag behind on vaccines intended to be administered by March, as Ireland is set to receive 300,000 fewer AstraZeneca vaccine doses than originally planned."
https://www.breakingnews.ie/covid-vaccine/ireland-unlikely-to-achieve-current-covid-19-vaccination-targets-taoiseach-says-1072928.html
Boris and his cronies should rot in hell.

What exactly is happening with AstraZeneca?

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