AZ have said their issue is a supplier in Belgium who makes the glass vials, so we'll have to see what comes out. But the EU banning exports, to people who placed orders early, is Trump level dickishness.

talkertopc: Carter Pewterschmidt: AZ have said their issue is a supplier in Belgium who makes the glass vials, so we'll have to see what comes out. But the EU banning exports, to people who placed orders early, is Trump level dickishness.

If there is not enough vaccine for their population then I don't see what is dickish about not sending them out to other countries.

To honour the contracts in order of those who placed orders first? The UK ordered vaccines months before the EU.

I can't help but think that if this was reversed, if it was Boris saying he would ban exports of the vaccine from UK factories to the EU, because "we have to put UK citizens first" then the EU, and Fark, would be apoplectic and outraged.

Zenith: er Nope
The EU are pointing out AZ appear to be ratting on a contract they signed and there maybe consequences for that.

If there is a manufacturing problem, apparently by the Belgian vial supplier, then wouldn't it be reasonable to deliver in order of those who placed their orders? The UK ordered vaccines months before the EU got around to it. Boris got on with it. The EU dragged their feet and took months to place their orders.

That's why one week into this month the UK had vaccinated well over a million people while France had vaccinated 500 and Holland hadn't even started.

Again, if this was Boris suggesting he might ban exports to the EU the EU would be outraged.

ZaphodTheSmall: Carter Pewterschmidt: AZ have said their issue is a supplier in Belgium who makes the glass vials, so we'll have to see what comes out. But the EU banning exports, to people who placed orders early, is Trump level dickishness.

Even the Daily Fail does not claim that there is a ban. The European Commission is worried that Pfizer and the likes may have oversold their limited capacity, and they (the EC) have asked for transparency about actual deliveries.

As news of the supply issues spread, EU president Ursula von der Leyen intervened - calling company chief Pascal Soriot on Monday to insist he 'must deliver'
'The EU helped with money to build research capacity and production facilities early on. Europe invested billions to help develop the world's first COVID-19 vaccines,' she said on Tuesday.
'Now the companies must deliver. They must honour their obligation. This is why we will set up a vaccine export transparency mechanism.'
The proposed mechanism would force manufacturers to report how many vaccines are produced in the EU and to obtain permits to ship those vaccines out.
That would theoretically allow European leaders to deny permits to vaccine shipments they would rather keep on their soil.
Speaking about the plans, German Health Minister Jens Spahn said: 'It makes sense that we have an export restriction.
'Vaccines that leave the European Union need a permit so that we can first of all know what is being manufactured in Europe, what is leaving Europe, where it is leaving Europe and whether it is then also a fair distribution.'

So the UK, who placed orders months before the EU, could be forced to wait until the EU decide to allow deliveries after putting their orders, that they placed months later, first.

Good thing the UK is speeding up completion of a UK vaccine super factory so we can make more here.

PvtStash: Asine subby?
Is it asine that when you divorce from your group, that they are not obligated to keep sharing with you as if you were still part of their group?

yeah we formed a co-op group to be helping each otehr as one big share a lot co-op group.

And then you left the group to go be doing it on your own, and you think it's asine when the now separate independent group you left, let's you know they don't have extra to share with those outside their group?

We placed our orders months before the EU. The EU dragged their feet and took months to decide. What is wrong with a company honouring sales contracts and delivering in order of orders being placed?

Scorpitron is reduced to a thin red paste: Belgium isn't part of the UK. I don't know why this is hard to figure out.

Indeed. It is in the EU.

So an EU company screws up and can't deliver, causing a shortage, the the EU then suggests banning contracted sales to the UK so they can leapfrog the queue to try to make up for the awful job they have done so far and because they are embarrassed the UK is doing a far better job?

Why should we suffer because of an EU supply issue?  Why should the EU, who placed their orders months after us, demand they get their deliveries first?

If this was reversed and it was Boris threatening this the EU and Farkers like you would be apoplectic.

buravirgil: Peeps dying?

Funny the EU didn't seem to care much about its people when it took months to place orders and approve vaccines when the UK got on with it and acted far quicker.

If the EU cared about its people it should have acted as quickly as the UK did. Then they wouldn't be so far behind us.

Scorpitron is reduced to a thin red paste: Maybe become a big boy and manufacture the materials yourself. That's what sovereignty means. Britain alone.

We are. The AZ Oxford vaccine is made here, as well as in Germany and Holland, and we're building a big new super factory to make vaccines in the future, due open this year.

Funny that some Farkers accuse the UK of being insular and cutting itself off from free trade etc but are now apparently cheering on the EU for suggesting they might ban exports that were placed perfectly legally just because they are butthurt about the UK doing a far better job with vaccines.

Why would anyone want to trade with the EU when they have shown they are happy to consider screwing you over when it suits them? The EU could be making itself an international pariah if it goes on breaking contracts that EU companies have signed.

phalamir: Britain treats the rest of Europe as subhuman trassh unworthy of anything except being raped by the English.  Then it gets mad when the reset of Europe does the same.  Poor babies.

Ireland, India, Kenya, the Gold Coast, and most recently Hing Kong, all stand by and watch, politely golf-clapping.

Why would the citizens of Hong Kong be anti British? We got the best deal we could from the Chinese when we handed HK back, and the Chinese more or less honoured it for a couple of decades. Now that they are cracking down on rights Boris has offered Hong Kong citizens the right to come to the UK, which has pissed off the Chinese. India has also welcomed the new immigration rules Boris has introduced.

And the UK has troops in places like Estonia and Poland helping defend Europe from Russia. How is that treating them as "subhuman trash"?

Scaley: The EU probably has a legit grip.
Pfizer is supplying a German/American vaccine that is made in the EU to the UK.
AstraZeneca is supplying an Anglo/Swedish vaccine that made in the EU to the EU.
AstraZeneca is also supplying a vaccine that is made in the UK to the UK.
AstraZeneca has just reneged on their contract to supply the EU by 60%.
The big question is AstraZeneca also reducing the UK's vaccine supply?
None of us really know, the UK is keeping its quantity of vaccine a state secret, and has since day one.

This leads me to believe that we've done something clever and underhand. We should just give the EU the phone number for Swedish customer help line. When the dust settles everyone can agree to blame Belgium.

Wouldn't honouring orders in the order they were placed be appropriate? The UK placed its orders several months before the EU did.

If the UK had placed orders three months after the EU and we were now saying the EU should give up a chunk of its orders so that we could leapfrog the queue what do you think the EU would have said?

orbister: Carter Pewterschmidt: And the UK has troops in places like Estonia and Poland helping defend Europe from Russia.

800 in Estonia, 150 in Poland. Wow.

As a political statement it is important. It means if Putin tries something and British troops get killed we will take action. And we have nukes. Not saying a nuke strike would be our Weeners, but it would be down the line somewhere...

orbister: Carter Pewterschmidt: If the UK had placed orders three months after the EU and we were now saying the EU should give up a chunk of its orders so that we could leapfrog the queue what do you think the EU would have said?

The timing of the orders is more-or-less irrelevant, which is why I presume you l keep banging on about it. What matters are the quantities and delivery dates in those orders. about which you are, I note, keeping very quiet indeed.

The delivery dates are relative to the orders. You placed orders first, you get first delivery. That's how most companies work. I don't think any pharma company has let any one country hog the entire production run, but do you have any evidence the UK has jumped the queue in any way? Because if the EU start banning exports, and introducing a permit for exports is clearly for that exact purpose, then it will be jumping the queue.

So can you post those order delivery dates and show where the UK has jumped the queue?

Scaley: It's not a bakery where you take a number.
The orders will be complex legal contracts involving hundreds of millions of pounds

So can you post the orders and delivery dates and show where the UK has jumped the queue?

mrschwen: talkertopc: Carter Pewterschmidt: AZ have said their issue is a supplier in Belgium who makes the glass vials, so we'll have to see what comes out. But the EU banning exports, to people who placed orders early, is Trump level dickishness.

If there is not enough vaccine for their population then I don't see what is dickish about not sending them out to other countries.

The AZ vaccine was a joint development by the UK and the EU. It belongs just as much to the EU as it does the UK.

Cite?

The EU hasn't even approved it yet. The UK has been vaccinating people for over three weeks.

Xai: Carter Pewterschmidt: Wouldn't honouring orders in the order they were placed be appropriate? The UK placed its orders several months before the EU did.

If the UK had placed orders three months after the EU and we were now saying the EU should give up a chunk of its orders so that we could leapfrog the queue what do you think the EU would have said?

You know I love this, you're acting like THEY should act in good faith towards us after we essentially told them to get farked.

You should own this, this is only possible thanks to you and people just like you and it clearly demonstrates how powerless we are since there is literally nothing we can do about it now.

Where did we tell them that? We politely exercised a leave clause they had in their own treaty. If they didn't want countries to leave why did they have a leave option?

And I am happy to own this. We approved the vaccines way earlier than the EU, and are way way ahead of them in vaccinating people. Thanks to being outside the EU.

Wanna know what the EU did?



They actually stopped several countries placing orders, and then took three months to place their own orders.

You bet I'm happy to own being outside the EU.

stuffy: Remember Brits this is what you voted for.

Well it's clearly working.

The fact that the EU are so butthurt over how well the UK is doing with vaccines that they are planning to ban shipments to us so they can catch up says it all.

Up until Monday, the UK had administered 10.5 vaccine doses per 100 population. Denmark - the EU country which is furthest ahead - had managed 3.6, Germany 2.1 and France just 1.6.
The Netherlands has delivered 0.8 per 100 - reportedly a factor in the riots in Dutch cities in recent days after a curfew was imposed and further months of lockdown loom.
While Britain still has a long way to go in its vaccination programme, we are on course to have offered every adult a jab by the autumn. At the rate other EU countries are going, however, they will be facing a second winter without a fully vaccinated population - a daunting prospect given how the second wave of the pandemic has taken off this winter.

For example, the EU balanced its order of 300million shots of the Pfizer vaccine (a collaboration with the German biotech firm BioNTech) with 300million shots of a vaccine being developed by French company Sanofi. Unfortunately, the Sanofi vaccine is unlikely to be ready for approval until the end of this year.
In the meantime, EU member states must rely on inadequate orders of the Pfizer and Moderna jabs and - should it be approved by the MHRA - the Oxford vaccine.
What has really angered Germany in particular is that Pfizer offered the EU a further 500million shots - yet, as German magazine Der Spiegel revealed last month, the EU turned them down on the grounds that it didn't want to undermine the market for the Sanofi vaccine.

To put it bluntly, the lives of EU citizens have been laid aside for blatantly nationalistic reasons - the French didn't want the Germans to steal a march on their pharmaceutical industry.
Yet when Germany, belatedly, attempted to set up its own vaccine-buying programme to bolster supplies, the EU threatened to sue it for failing to stick to its agreement to rely only on EU vaccine purchases.

Yep, so glad we're out of the EU and have the power to do what we want.

/Anyone criticising the DM source please back up your criticisms with where factually the article is wrong. Otherwise you're just criticising the messenger to distract from the message.
//And if you think banning exports and refusing to honour contracts is fine, ask yourself what you would think if it was refusing to deliver orders by the USA or Canada just so that it could keep the vaccines for itself.

Xai: Carter Pewterschmidt: stuffy: Remember Brits this is what you voted for.

[Fark user image 850x518]

Well it's clearly working.

The fact that the EU are so butthurt over how well the UK is doing with vaccines that they are planning to ban shipments to us so they can catch up says it all.

Yet again you're debating this dishonestly - the rate at which we are vaccinating has nothing to do with this since the oxford vaccine was able to have been developed, manufactured and deployed if we had remained within the EU. The difference is that shipments couldn't have been blocked as they are now.

Stop trying to distract with an avalanche of other topics - this is all about the fact that they now get to dictate what and how trade across the border occurs and we have to simply bend over and take whatever decision they wish to impart on us.

Thanks to you.

But the UK would have been forbidden from placing its own orders, many months before the EU did, and from approving the vaccine way before the EU did, so we would have been forced to act far slower.



Spot the country outside the EU. That's not an accident. It's not a coincidence.

Even German newspapers are saying this is "an advert for Brexit" and slamming the EU for being far to slow to act.

Had we been in the EU we would have been forbidden from placing our own orders months before the EU and forbidden forbidden from approving the vaccines far earlier.

orbister: Carter Pewterschmidt: The delivery dates are relative to the orders. You placed orders first, you get first delivery. That's how most companies work. I

No, you get delivery when your contract says. If you book an airline flight in July you don't have to wait to fly until all the people who booked in June have done so.

Can you link to the text of the contract that says the UK agreed a later delivery date?

Can you explain why in a pandemic killing people any country would ever agree to a delivery date way down the line? This isn't booking a holiday.

Asked why supplies were being cut to the EU but not the recently-departed UK, Pascal Soriot said it had nothing to do with national favoritism and everything to do with the fact that the EU placed its vaccine order late.
'We had problems in the UK too,' he told a trio of European newspapers including Italy's Repubblica on Tuesday.
'But the contract with the British government was signed three months before the one with the EU, therefore we had time to prepare and resolve similar issues.
'The UK and the EU have two different production chains and at the moment the British ones are more efficient because they started earlier.'
Britain signed a contract for 300million doses of vaccine in mid-May, he revealed, but it took the EU until August to put pen to paper on the same deal.
Embarrassingly for the bloc, it appears that Germany, the Netherlands, France and Italy had originally been looking to do a deal with AstraZeneca in May alongside the UK - but were blocked by the EU, which insisted it take over negotiations.

Xai: Carter Pewterschmidt: //And if you think banning exports and refusing to honour contracts is fine, ask yourself what you would think if it was refusing to deliver orders by the USA or Canada just so that it could keep the vaccines for itself.

You bring up a good point. There are no threats to stop deliveries to the US, are they? Almost as though we have no leverage and are forced to accept whatever trade terms they force on us, isn't it?

Canada is a far smaller country than the UK, with a similar free trade deal. So is Canada being threatened?

And lets just be clear, you are supporting the EU refusing to allow a company to honour a contract and deliver goods as agreed?

Has Boris or Trump threatened to ban vaccine exports, refused to honour contracts and keep all the vaccine for themselves you'd have been okay with that?

orbister: That's on top of the deliberate misrepresentations and dishonesty, of course.

Such as?

orbister: Carter Pewterschmidt: Can you link to the text of the contract that says the UK agreed a later delivery date?

Can you explain why in a pandemic killing people any country would ever agree to a delivery date way down the line?

The Pfizer vaccine can only be stored cryogenically for thirty days. Even Boris probably isn't stupid enough to order 80m doses for delivery in one load.

You are clearly manufacturing outrage to divert attention from England's appalling handling of the pandemic.

So you can't back your claim up with the contract details then?

orbister: Carter Pewterschmidt: orbister: That's on top of the deliberate misrepresentations and dishonesty, of course.

Such as?

Almost everything you write about Brexit or COVID.

Such as?

Because if you refuse to give a specific example then some might suspect you can't actually come up with anything to back up your claim. Like the way you seem adamant that the vaccine contract is behind the EUs actions, but can't actually link to it.

And, having suggest export bans from the EU the EU is now demanding the UK sends vaccine made in the UK to the EU.

So having defended an export ban "to look after the people" I assume Farkers will have no problem with Boris banning exports from the UK to look after British people, right? Right?

The EU is acting 'slowly, bureaucratically and protectionist... and if something goes wrong, it's everyone else's fault' fumed a front-page editorial in Die Zeit, one of Germany's best-respected broadsheets.
Meanwhile Bild tore apart Von Der Leyen's explanation of the vaccine delays and threat to stop supplies heading to the UK line by line, accusing her of placing 'junk' orders for vaccines three months late.
'She says: 'We know that there is no time to lose in a pandemic,' but what she means is: 'We may have wasted time. But we will NEVER admit that'', the paper said, before adding that 'Brexit Brits continue to receive full supplies.'
Both reports quoted an employee for AstraZeneca, who said: 'I understand Brexit a bit better now.'

orbister: Carter Pewterschmidt: So you can't back your claim up with the contract details then?

You're the one making the claims. You back 'em up.

Really? So you didn't say:  

orbister: What matters are the quantities and delivery dates in those orders. about which you are, I note, keeping very quiet indeed.

You say those details are something I am "keeping very quiet about". Turns out even EU MEPs haven't been allowed to see those details, so what exactly am I "keeping quiet about"?

orbister: You have argued in bad faith on these matters for so long and so consistently, and you have been caught out in so many lies, half-truths, misrepresentations and evasions that there is simply no point in engaging with you.

I note, for example, your refusal in this thread to address the 50% higher per capita death rates and total deaths in England compared to Scotland in favour of some unsupported bollocks about vaccine contracts.

Deflection at its finest. The UK has been hit by a deadlier strain, but you want to focus on deaths and dismiss and ignore the utter clusterfark the EU has made of vaccinations and the huge lead the UK has.
In six months if the UK has deaths well down and the EU is being hit badly by the new strains and the lack of vaccinations you will suddenly demand we ignore the daily death rates because reasons and cherry pick something else that you can find where the EU is doing better than the UK.

Cortina: You tosser. The EU placed an initial order for 80 million doses and payed up front for a lot of research (not only to AZ).

The UK also placed an order, three months before the EU. The UK also paid a lot of money for research. Why should we be forced to the back of the queue? When we ordered three months earlier?

Cortina: The EU has asked AZ nicely why there is such a big gap of 50 million doses. AZ cannot account for this gap. Which is odd, you would think they have that on paper somewhere and can easily proof they did their best, that this is all they could do and everybody is getting their fair share.
Oddly enough, it has been several days and AZ still hasn't been able to show why the EU is 50 million doses short.

Yes they have. There is a problem with a factory in Belgium. Because the UK placed an order three months earlier the production line for the UK order was set up far earlier and they had time to sort out teething problems.

Cortina: So what needs to happen now is clarity because it is very weird they can't deliver half of what was promised, best effort or not. Personally I find this all very fishy on AZ's part, but I'll wait untill more facts come out. I prefer that over fuming over some tabloids publication and taking that as a fact, as you always seem to do.

When Pfizer announced a couple of weeks ago there would be a big delay in shipments the UK didn't throw its toys out of the pram and start demanding the EU give up their supply so we could get ours.

Cortina: And before you trigger on the wrong argument again: noone is saying the EU acted quickly or anything. As a EU member I think it's taking way too slow. But as usual with your arguments: it has nothing to do with the issue at hand here. Nor  is it when it was ordered. If the EU came after the UK and AZ couldn't do 80 million doses, they should have stated such at the time. They didn't.

But your yourself just admitted there was a "best efforts" clause. This was an order placed before the vaccine was anywhere near ready. Of course there would have been a "Subject to availability" clause.

Ask yourself if, and be honest here, if the problem was in the UK factory and we were the ones demanding the EU give up its shipments so we could get ours first what do you think the EU would have said? Farkers in this thread have already said "well of course the EU puts its people first" so I think we both know the answer to that.

And of course the time we placed the order will matter. Do you think we could have done nothing for the whole year and then phoned up Pfizer on January first and said "Yeah, we'd like a hundred million does, and we'd like them this week. Thanks."? Of course placing the order three months earlier will make a huge difference.

Funny that only a couple of months ago there were Farkers seriously saying they thought people would die because the UK wouldn't be able to get medicines, but one month after leaving the EU it is the EU demanding we send British made medicine to them.

Cortina: Carter Pewterschmidt: The UK also placed an order, three months before the EU.

I rest my case.

That your entire argument was wrong? The UK ordered three months before the EU so of course they will get preference.

Do you think we could have done nothing for the whole year and then phoned up Pfizer on January first and said "Yeah, we'd like a hundred million does, and we'd like them this week. Thanks."? Of course placing the order three months earlier will make a huge difference.

The AZ boss has given more detail.

That agreement was struck three months before the EU's deal as ministers took advantage of their post-Brexit freedom to go it alone rather than signing up to EU-wide procurement.
While Britain was setting up its logistics and sorting out supply chains, the EU's negotiations with AstraZeneca became mired in bureaucracy, costing the bloc vital time which has now been manifested in its supply problems.
On Tuesday, the AstraZeneca CEO, Pascal Soriot, said separate supply chains, including manufacturing plants, had been created for each order - one for the EU and one for the UK. This was done explicitly to stop squabbling over supply.

The EU supply chain was behind because the bloc, late to the party, was still experiencing teething problems with production - problems the UK supply chain had also suffered initially but had overcome.

The EU then criticised AZ for revealing the "best efforts" clause, blowing a hole in the EUs claims that AZ had guaranteed delivery.

They then demanded UK made vaccines, only a day after threatening to ban EU exports.

Ms Kyriakides said there was "no priority clause" in the EU contract between the four production plants in the agreement, which include two factories in the EU and the two in the UK, adding: "In our contract, it is not specified that any country or the UK has priority [...] this needs to be absolutely clear."
The European Commission's chief spokesperson said: "If UK plants are working better, are we expecting UK plants to deliver doses to the EU? Yes we do. "

A bit rich considering that only yesterday they were threatening banning exports from the EU to the UK to put EU citizens first and to not fulfil UK orders. If they can ban exports so can we.