Note specifically the lack of exemption for Northern Ireland 
I bet nobody thought that it would be the EU to first seek recourse to Article 16 of the Ireland/Northern Ireland protocol.
1 Like
My simple impression based on what I’ve scanned through here is that the EU had a valid query with regard to deliveries of the vaccine but instead of asking the question politely VdL decided to go for the jugular and has come unstuck. That seems a bit mad considering the vaccine isn’t approved yet.
I do wonder if her blowing the situation up is a bit of a personal frustration of having just come through the Brexit negotiations?
Would that be the right interpretation or am I confusing apples and pears again?
Not at all. For the EU this is between them and AZ nothing more nothing less. It’s others that are making this an issue.
There’s perhaps some cross over into controlling exports but hey ‘they’ have over 450 million people to worry about and what those people might think.
In any case it’s Belgiums fault.
2 Likes
Maybe somehow weird for some of you, but Brexit or the UK isn’t mentioned at all over here. At least not in the serious media. I haven’t seen anything here.
I mean, if you don’t get the furniture delivered that you’ve ordered by Ikea, you don’t blame the Swedish Government?
5 Likes
Could also be the first indication of a problem many have pointed out as problematic. Israel is the first country to have a significant percentage of the population vaccinated. It may already have a significant percentage of the population that have decided they no longer need to take restrictions seriously.
1 Like
I think what happened is the 61% shortfall in the 1st quarter couldn’t be hidden then some poor politicians and advisors went OTT and the UK media went well OTT.
I can imagine that France is embarrassed about this (but won’t say publically) they would have preferred keeping the reponse under wraps and taking AZ to task (which I think they will do in the longer term (it’s not the 1st time)).
It really has nothing to do with Brexit until the UK put their faces in!
2 Likes
I don’t think Brexit matters particularly for the EU. They are long since heartily sick of it. European expectations and the reality now have a massive gap that is not going to be resolved quickly, and people will die as a result. The EC seems motivated to move blame out of Brussels and stick it somewhere else.
3 Likes
This was the editorial in Die Zeit from 2 days ago,
“AstraZeneca - The best advertisement for Brexit”
Maybe Die Zeit isn’t considered serious media although I thought it was.
1 Like
Actually, I hold all Swedes in general responsible for anything involving Allen keys and similar fasteners.
3 Likes
Not in the least surprised to see no exemption for Canada, despite Trudeau’s handwaving about the relationship. Good to see that the Canada-EU relationship does not rate mention with Algeria, Egypt, Jordan. etc…
Moderna just announced a cut to Canada’s February shipments too.
3 Likes
You realise that the UK was keeping out of it, right? It was the EU that sought to involve us by demanding that vaccines meant for the UK were diverted to the EU and that any vaccines leaving the EU to anywhere would be subject to restrictions (save for some limited exemptions).
What is Canada’s capacity/capability for manufacturing the vaccines in Canada? Have you got any orders that might be coming from the UK because currently UK production looks fairly sound now, after initial snags.
That sound plausible and I agree with regard to Brexit other than VdL was heavily involved in it and perhaps saw the opportunity to vent. It of course has nothing to do with this actual contract.
If the delivery is that far short they are perfectly right to query it but it’s gone mental. The sad thing is that there are bound to be portions of the UK press using this.
1 Like
Essentially zero. No mRNA capability. Last vaccine plants closed about a decade ago, other than a small facility near Montreal that is meant to support research field trials. Solid R&D (Ebola vaccine is Canadian) but outsourced production. Generally supplied from US manufacturing, but that is as interesting to Biden as it was to Trump.
We have a massive portfolio (per capita, world’s largest, now 9x population) spread across virtually all contenders, but delivery is problematic - Astra-Zeneca orders are way behind in the queue.
Makes me think we should repurpose our NATO expenditures into backup vaccine manufacturing capability.
1 Like
It’s gone so mental that the issues have been forgotten. Just look at what’s being said on this forum, usually sensible debate until Brexit comes up or some other UK centered stuff.
1 Like
Or until the EU is criticised. In any way whatsoever.
1 Like
Would it be correct to assume that Macron will be over the moon, given that France won’t be getting any AZ vaccine any time soon?
1 Like
I imagine that AZ must be pretty tempted to cancel any obligation to supply Germany, France or the rest of the EU for that matter given the damaging remarks that have been made over the last few days.
1 Like
And who could blame them?
2 Likes