The European Commission (EC) on Wednesday changed the control system for the export of vaccines so that when deciding whether to allow the delivery of medicines produced in the Community to third countries, it will be considered whether they also export doses to the EU. and how many citizens have been vaccinated, according to European sources.
To date, the only criterion considered to block the export of vaccines has been whether the sale of doses to third countries has prevented pharmaceutical companies from fulfilling their contractual commitments with the European Union (EU).
Now, the decision will also be made on the basis of the principles of reciprocity (the extent to which a country also exports vaccines to the EU) and proportionality (which is the ratio between the vaccinated population and its epidemiological situation).
European sources have said that it is not a country-specific measure, but that the decision will be made “on a case-by-case basis”, but EU Executive Chairman Ursula Von der Leyen said last week that Brussels was considering stopping exports to The United Kingdom has failed to deliver doses of AstraZeneca to the EU.
“The reality is that the US gives priority to vaccines for US citizens until everyone is vaccinated, there are currently (not) doses arriving in the EU from the UK,” the sources said.
Brussels has been criticizing for days that the vaccines do not reach the EU from the two factories that AstraZeneca has in the United Kingdom and that, according to the contract signed with the EC, they should supply part of the doses purchased.
Instead, there have been 10 million doses in the EU in the UK, a conflict that Europe is trying to resolve with the British government.
“We are talking to all our partners,” the sources said.
Since the vaccine’s export mechanism was launched in February, the EU has authorized 380 deliveries to third countries and blocked only the transport of 250,000 doses of AstraZeneca from Italy to Australia.
The Commission introduced these changes a day before the virtual summit that European leaders will hold tomorrow and Friday, in which delays in EU vaccination campaigns will focus discussions.
AstraZeneca’s non-compliance became a problem for countries such as Bulgaria and Latvia, which made a strong bet on their vaccines when a contract was signed last August with the pharmaceutical company, which at the time was the first, with the cheapest drugs and whose technology is already known to be similar to that used against influenza.