However it appears the EU is claiming AstraZeneca is reneging on the specific delivery schedule contained in it's contract, and there is no indication that that is being caused by production problems.

So why the delay? Did AstraZeneca sign up to over-optimistic production targets? Has it diverted supplies elsewhere? It seems quite reasonable to assume that producing billions of doses to an ambitious schedule is no easy task and unforeseen difficulties could arise.

The situation is not helped by the hubristic and nationalistic tone of UK government communications and the way this is being played into existing narratives of the EU Commission being a bureaucratic morass unable or unwilling to respond decisively to a crisis.

However it should be no more controversial for AstraZeneca supplies to be exported from Britain to the EU  than for Pfizer supplies to be exported from Belgium to the UK.

What makes the whole controversy even more unedifying is the way it portrays rich countries fighting each other over preferential treatment with no one caring about leaving poorer countries at the back of the queue.

When you add in the fact that Israel managed to vaccinate over half their total population by securing huge early supplies by paying more for their doses but then restricted access to Israeli settlers in Palestinian territories and making none available to the local Palestinian population - the elitist and racist dimensions of the scandal come into sharp relief.

Given that both Israel and the UK have had very severe outbreaks, an objective case could have been made for supplying those health systems early in the process. But that is not how it looks, with both governments taking a Britain first or Israelis first propaganda approach to their vaccination programmes.

If Brexit wasn't enough to poison EU/UK relations, this controversy could make it ten times worse. But I suspect it is too late for even the adults in the room to limit the damage now. This has become deeply personal for many citizens and they will not let their leaders forget it.

Index of Frank's Diaries

#BREAKING: Bahrain approves Oxford-AstraZeneca #COVID19 vaccine for emergency use - @bna_ar [_link] pic.twitter.com/w22gtpuxjK

— Arab News (@arabnews) January 25, 2021

Bahrain takes delivery of AstraZeneca vaccine from India

WEF: Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the country would introduce more locally made COVID-19 vaccines as New Delhi continues to save lives of people in other countries by exporting medicines and vaccines.

On Monday, SII Chief Executive Adar Poonawalla told Reuters the firm, the world's biggest vaccine manufacturer, would supply Saudi Arabia with 3 million AstraZeneca vaccine doses priced at $5.25 each in about a week.

Part of the Abrahams Business Accords

'Sapere aude'

Just launched: the Lowy Institute COVID Performance Index

A new digital interactive on how almost 100 countries have managed the #coronavirus pandemic.

Research by @HerveLemahieu and @AlyssaLeng, design by @__brodysmith[_link]

— The Lowy Institute (@LowyInstitute) January 27, 2021

#AstraZeneca's #Covid19 vaccine should only be given to people aged between 18 and 64, #Germany's vaccine committee said in a draft recommendation, a day ahead of a decision by European regulators on whether to approve the drugmaker's shot [_link]

— The Daily Star (@dailystarnews) January 28, 2021

Political Animal In Downing Street

EU seeks access to AstraZeneca's Covid-19 vaccines produced at UK plants | France24 |

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said it would have been a "great pity" if the United Kingdom had stayed in the European Union's vaccine programme rather than set up its own plan.

"I do think that we've been able to do things differently, and better, in some ways," he said in parliament.

PM Mark Rutte had tied the Dutch to the science of Boris Johnson and Oxford ... even hired Dr. Levi as personal advisor to tackle the SARS Cov-2 pandemic ...

Still not approved by the FDA in the US although $1.2bn was poured into the development with BIG publicity in Operation Warp Speed ...

Blunders Eroded U.S. Confidence in Early Vaccine Front-Runner |  NY Times - Dec. 8, 2020 |

The Oxford-AstraZeneca effort held great promise to help arrest the pandemic. But a series of miscues caused it to fall behind in the U.S.

'Sapere aude'

EU could block millions of Covid vaccine doses from entering UK | The Guardian |

The criteria for blocking exports will be published on Friday, with adoption of the mechanism expected within the coming days.

The extraordinary development came as Belgian regulators were sent in to AstraZeneca's coronavirus vaccine production site near Brussels at the request of the Ecommission. A first visit by officials from the Belgian federal medicines agency was completed on Wednesday at the site in Seneffe, Hainaut, the health ministry in Belgium said. Samples and records were taken from the plant, and a further inspection of the facility is expected in the coming days.

...
On Thursday the Cabinet Office minister, Michael Gove, said the UK would only help the EU with doses if there were spare vials. "We will want to talk to and with our friends in Europe to see how we can help," he said. "But the really important thing is to make sure our own vaccination programme proceeds precisely as planned."

💉🦠 #Sanofi will fill and pack millions of doses of #Pfizer's #COVID19 #vaccine from July in an effort to help meet the huge demand for the #US drugmaker's shots.

The French company aims to help supply more than 100 million doses of the vaccine this year.@erinogun reports ⤵️ pic.twitter.com/NGWUWIxNyT

— FRANCE 24 English (@France24_en) January 27, 2021

Tomorrow's @independent front page #tomorrowspaperstoday To subscribe to the Daily Edition [_link] pic.twitter.com/6Mw95Ipa3K

— The Independent (@Independent) January 28, 2021

How should countries and international bodies build an effective vaccine responses? Our data suggests a broad range of accelerated public investments in trials, manufacturing, supply chain security and multi-technology investments are critical. Important piece in @FT . pic.twitter.com/ljX0pQGIQD

— Airfinity (@Airfinity) January 26, 2021

How do countries rank when it comes to handling the #covid19 pandemic?

According to a research published by Sydney's @LowyInstitute, 🇧🇷 #Brazil's handling of the #coronavirus pandemic has been ranked the world's worst, while #NewZealand topped the class[_link]

— FRANCE 24 English (@France24_en) January 28, 2021

Serum Institute of India obtains emergency use authorisation in India for AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine | Jan. 6, 2021 |

AstraZeneca is working with its global partners to continue building manufacturing capacity of up to three billion doses of the vaccine globally in 2021 on a rolling basis, pending regulatory approvals.

New production sites

AstraZeneca aims to produce a billion doses at the Serum Institute of India, which is the world's largest vaccine manufacturer.

Establishing manufacturing facilities worldwide is seen as crucial for enabling fair global access to vaccines.

Deadly fire at massive Indian plant cranking out Oxford's COVID vaccine | CBS News - Jan. 22, 2021  |

Five people were killed by a fire that erupted at the sprawling complex of the Serum Institute of India, one of the world's biggest vaccine-making facilities which is currently producing millions of doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine.

Several middle- and low-income nations are relying on the Serum Institute to supply their coronavirus vaccine stocks through the global, WHO-backed COVAX plan.  

...
India exported first batches of the Oxford-formulated vaccine from Serum to Bhutan and the Maldives on Wednesday.

The U.K.'s mass-vaccination plan is also relying heavily on the Oxford/AstraZeneca drug, but that stock is being produced in Britain.

Infographic - Countries Making Covid-19 Vaccines

According to @Airfinity, the U.S. has the capability to produce almost 4.7b COVID-19 vaccine doses by the end of 2021, and India can make more than 3b. India is home to the largest vaccine manufacturer in the world, The Serum Institute of India. [_link] pic.twitter.com/FBj8D9Ch5Z

— Statista (@StatistaCharts) January 11, 2021

The idea was to provide medicines preventing or treating COVID-19 at a low cost or free of charge, the British university said. That made sense to people seeking change. The coronavirus was raging. Many agreed that traditional vaccine development, characterized by long lead times, manufacturing monopolies and weak investment, was broken.

"We actually thought they were going to do that," James Love, director of Knowledge Ecology International, a nonprofit that works to expand access to medical technology, said of Oxford's pledge. "Why wouldn't people agree to let everyone have access to the best vaccines possible?"

A few weeks later, Oxford--urged on by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation--reversed course. It signed an exclusive vaccine deal with AstraZeneca that gave the pharmaceutical giant sole rights and no guarantee of low prices--with the less-publicized potential for Oxford to eventually make millions from the deal and win plenty of prestige.

Transparency and accountability are essential to build the people's trust in our vaccine strategy.

We just published the contract we concluded with @AstraZeneca

We owe it to the citizens. I hope more contracts will be published in the future.[_link]

— Stella Kyriakides (@SKyriakidesEU) January 29, 2021

Hungary has become the first EU member to approve the Chinese-made Sinopharm coronavirus vaccine. [_link]

— DW News (@dwnews) January 29, 2021

Juristen sehen @EU_Commission im #Impfstoff-Streit mit #AstraZeneca eher im Recht - aber was hilft's? [_link] #Impfstoffmangel #Impfdesaster

— Markus Becker (@MarkusBecker) January 29, 2021

In a further passage, AstraZeneca guarantees that it has no obligations towards other contractual partners that would be an obstacle to the full performance of the contract with the EU. That seems to contradict the company's argument that it has to deliver less because the British ordered first.

"AstraZeneca therefore cannot cite problems in a single plant in Belgium as a reason to break its commitments to the EU," said the SPD MEP and former Federal Minister of Justice Katarina Barley. Other legal experts see it similarly. "In the contract there is no mandatory connection between the delivery obligation and the place of production," states the Passau law professor and contract law expert Thomas Riehm. So it is »not so that AstraZeneca can say that we cannot produce enough in the EU, so you get less«.

His Marburg colleague Wolfgang Voit also explains: "In my opinion, production in the United Kingdom is on an equal footing with production in the EU." Another paragraph explicitly states that the vaccine doses that AstraZeneca should deliver to the EU are also in Great Britain can be made to meet the obligation.

When it comes to #AstraZeneca, the facts have to be on the table. And the company has to secure production capacities from other pharmaceutical companies if it has failures itself. BioNTech recently proved that this is possible and brought Sanofi on board. [Katarina Barley]

'Sapere aude'

Research Janssen Pharmaceutical in Leiden, the Netherlands.

'Sapere aude'

The EU has withdrawn its plans to control the exports of #COVID19 vaccines into Northern Ireland, according to Sky sources [_link]

— Sky News (@SkyNews) January 29, 2021

I spoke to Taoiseach @MichealMartinTD this evening to agree on a satisfactory way to introduce an export authorisation mechanism for COVID vaccines.

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) January 29, 2021

Constructive talks with Prime Minister @BorisJohnson tonight.

We agreed on the principle that there should not be restrictions on the export of vaccines by companies where they are fulfilling contractual responsibilities.

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) January 29, 2021

An illustration how hard the non-compliance of Oxford / AstraZeneca hit the countries of the EU-27. Due to globalization almost all pharmaceutical manufacturing relies on imports. The Brexit deficit playing out in number of Covid-19 deaths.

Catastrophic errors in the handling of coronavirus | The Guardian - Opinion |

'Sapere aude'

You can find the new sequences from Australia (29) on [_link].

(Thanks to MDU-PHL, @SAHealth, VIDRL, @NSWHPathology, @WestSydHealth, @Sydney_Uni, #PathWest Laboratory Medicine, @WAHealth)

5/5 pic.twitter.com/Ng4bw0o2FI

— Nextstrain (@nextstrain) January 23, 2021

GESS: a database of global evaluation of SARS-CoV-2/hCoV-19 sequences | Oxford Academic |

'Sapere aude'

Newspaper headlines: 'EU vaccine war explodes', and Macron 'attacks' Oxford jab [_link>

— BBC News (UK) (@BBCNews) January 29, 2021

'Half-friends is not a concept': UK should decide who its allies are, says Macron [_link]

— The Guardian (@guardian) January 30, 2021

Arlene Foster urges Boris Johnson to replace NI protocol [_link]

— Guardian news (@guardiannews) January 30, 2021

EU vaccine row 'political penalty kick for unionists' | BBC News |

Whatever the sequencing and the hard conversation between Dublin and Brussels, political parties in Northern Ireland are already picking through the wreckage to salvage what they can.

For Sinn Féin, the SDLP and Alliance, it is all about damage limitation and ensuring Brussels has learned lessons from its costly political blunder.

But for the DUP and Ulster Unionists, it has supercharged their onslaught on the Northern Ireland protocol.

They can say that, at the first sign of trouble, Brussels effectively advocated for the same hard land border it had fought years to prevent.

It was a political penalty kick for unionists into an open goal.

Now the glass is broken they want London to push the same emergency Article 16 button.

Nationalism and the global SARS CoV-2 pandemic ... getting it wrong most of the time! From herd immunity to economic favors to failing to protect the frontline workers and vulnerable persons in society. Guardianship and responsibility in leadership.

Hoarding Covid-19 vaccines `keeps the pandemic burning', says WHO | Irish Times |

'Sapere aude'

Free vaccines and India's humanitarian diplomacy

More than 5 million Indian-made vaccines were airlifted last week to countries extending from Myanmar and Bangladesh to Mauritius and the Seychelles. And millions of more free vaccines are on their way this week.

India's free-vaccine diplomacy, however, has been driven by more than altruism. There are geopolitical considerations at play, including building goodwill and influence and countering China's growing strategic footprint in the Indian Ocean region.

...
India already has agreed to supply more than one billion coronavirus vaccines to various countries and to the World Health Organization-backed Covax initiative aimed at poorer countries. India is currently manufacturing two vaccines -- the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine, known in India as Covishield, and Covaxin, developed by the Indian pharmaceutical firm Bharat Biotech. Three other Indian companies are close to wrapping up development of their own vaccines.

Before India granted emergency approval to Covishield and Covaxin in early January, the privately-owned Serum Institute of India (SII) -- the world's largest maker of vaccines by volume and the leading production partner of AstraZeneca-Oxford -- had already manufactured and stocked between 70 to 80 million Covishield doses. This large stockpile has meant that India has enough vaccines to share with other countries.

AstraZeneca to supply Europe with up to 400 million doses of Oxford University's vaccine at no profit | Press statement June 13, 2020 |

'Sapere aude'

From my diary of March 17, 2020:

CureVac In Germany: Trump's Failed Takeover Bid

In a moment of global crisis, the worst of human kind outs itself ... or society can come together to fight a common enemy. The ultra-narcist in the leader of America came to the forefront: buy the German vaccine and we'll market as ::

FOR AMERICA ONLY!

"We've got the BEST doctors, scientists, hospitals ... we're doing a great job. Very early I closed to borders to China ... saved thousands of lives!"

Donald Trump greift nach deutscher Impfstoff-Firma | Die Welt - 5 Marz 2020 |

The EU Commission took the route of multilateralism ...

'Vaccine nationalism' delays WHO's struggling Covax scheme | FT - Sept. 2, 2020 |

The European Commission said this week it would offer €400m in guarantees to Covax to help supply vaccines to low and middle income countries. Both the commission and the WHO said the exact terms of the EU's relationship with Covax were still being worked out. The WHO also said Germany had joined Covax.

Covax has struggled to convince high income countries to use the facility for their own domestic vaccine procurement. Rich nations including the US, Japan and the UK have done their own private deals to secure doses instead.

...
The WHO has warned countries about the long-term risks of relying on bilateral procurement.

"We have two choices: vaccine nationalism, where a lot of people are vaccinated in a handful of countries, leaving the world's majority unprotected; or vaccine multilateralism, where we protect at-risk populations in all countries and keep our economies working," Mariângela Simão, the WHO's assistant director-general for access to medicines, told the FT.

WHO emergency COVID-19 vaccine listing aims to lift access in poor countries | Reuters - Jan. 1, 2021 |

"This is a small world now. A village, a global village. And we need to help one another. It's only through solidarity and unity that we can defeat this pandemic. It's not through a 'me first' attitude."

-@WHO Director-General @DrTedros today. #COVID19 #ACTogether #VaccinEquity pic.twitter.com/Tk7kTWubbH

— Global Health Strategies (@GHS) January 29, 2021

Covid vaccines to be recorded in Dublin in compromise deal | The Guardian |

Vaccine doses crossing the border between the Republic and Northern Ireland will have to be recorded in Dublin but they will not be at risk of being blocked under an EU regulation in force to avoid shortages in the bloc.

Brussels wants to ensure that pharmaceutical companies producing in the EU supply the member states with the doses committed to in their contracts.

Vaccines distributed to the UK from Belgian and German plants

...
Officials on Saturday said they remained determined to hold the pharmaceutical companies to account, with vaccine shortages being reported across the block.

"We have a serious issue with a company that has signed a contract with us saying that it was to put at our disposal vaccines from two factories from the UK - and has not delivered a single dose from those factories," an EU official said. "And it was clearly saying, supported by the British government, that those factories will not be delivering vaccines to the EU until the UK has got the 100m doses it is supposed to get. This is a serious issue for us."

Australia to receive first batch of AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine in Jan 2021 - PM to say | Reuters - Sept. 5, 2020 |

Australia said in August it had signed a preliminary agreement with AstraZeneca for enough doses for its population of nearly 26 million, which would be manufactured locally by pharmaceutical company CSL.

That deal appeared in some doubt when CSL said its priority was manufacturing an alternative potential vaccine developed with the University of Queensland (UQ).

Agreeing a deal to overcome the potential roadblock, Australia will now also buy 51 million doses of the UQ vaccine.

It will take possession of the first 3.8 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine in January and February 2021, and then receive a further 30 million doses.

Is PM Morrison of Australia getting priority to fill the gap left by domestic UQ failure? Negative, Australia and New Zealand have managed to mitigate the Coronavirus and are in a much better position to delay vaccinations. The UK and EU countries truly screwed up in wavering between health and opening up the economy ... a lose-lose choice.

CSL, University of Queensland quit COVID-19 vaccine trials due to HIV antibody response | BioWorld - Dec. 11, 2020 |

Australia's vaccine agreements

'Sapere aude'

Brazil will receive between 10 million and 14 million doses of AstraZeneca's coronavirus vaccine starting in mid-February through the World Health Organization's Covax programme, according to the country's health ministry.

Brazilian health regulator Anvisa said that AstraZeneca had applied for full regulatory approval, a positive note for the country's difficult vaccine roll-out.

The submission, the first of its kind in Brazil, was made by the federally funded Fiocruz Institute, which will manufacture the British vaccine locally.

'Sapere aude'

Panel discussion about role Big Pharma and role of states to secure necessary vaccines.

Will 'vaccine nationalism' prolong the pandemic? | Al Jazeera |

Germany sends medical experts to Portugal as hospitals face COVID-19 crisis

𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗮𝗺 𝘃𝗮𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗮𝗱𝗮𝘀 𝟭𝟰.𝟰𝟵𝟲 𝗽𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗼𝗮𝘀 𝗻𝗮𝘀 𝘂́𝗹𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗮𝘀 𝟮𝟰 𝗵𝗼𝗿𝗮𝘀

'𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐨́𝐢𝐬'
Ilustração de Vasco Gargalo pic.twitter.com/gdwTkIcPx4

— Ricardo B. Leite (@RBaptistaLeite) January 30, 2021

Hungary:

Gulyás: EU's vaccine procurement is "sluggish"

BREAKING: FM Szijjártó announced that Hungary will purchase 5 million coronavirus vaccines from Chinese manufacturer Sinopharm. He noted that Hungarians in HU will not be the first ones to receive the shot as 300,000 have already been inoculated in Serbia.

— Zoltan Kovacs (@zoltanspox) January 29, 2021

Janssen vaccine produced in the Netherlands shows 66 percent efficacy [_link]

— NL Times (@NL_Times) January 31, 2021

Covid-19 vaccine candidate: Novasep signs a Master Supply and Development Agreement with AstraZeneca | Novasep - Nov. 12, 2020 |

Novasep, a leading supplier of services and technologies for the life sciences industry, is pleased to announce that it has now signed a multi-year Master Supply and Development Agreement with AstraZeneca to support large-scale production of the active substance of the adenovirus vector-based COVID-19 vaccine candidate, AZD1222.

This new contract follows the initial agreement signed between AstraZeneca and Novasep Belgium on June 14th in the context of the Inclusive Alliance for Vaccines (IAV), whose members are France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands.  [Who was late at the table BoJo? ... honor British commitments]

The production of the vaccine candidate active substance under this supply agreement will be carried out at Novasep's site located in Seneffe, Belgium which expects to increase its workforce from 280 to close to 400 by 2021 to support this project.

AstraZeneca COVID-19 Vaccine (AZD1222) Distribution

On December 8, 2020, Halix B.V. announced it would provide commercial manufacturing of drug substance at its state-of-the-art cGMP facility at the Leiden Bio Science Park in the Netherlands. HALIX expands with 2 additional viral vector production lines to meet the increased demand.

Halix - Excellence in GMP Manufacturing

The 6,700 m2 BSL2 GMP facility, recently approved by the Dutch authorities and located on the Leiden Bio Science Park in the Netherlands, provides both clinical and commercial scale manufacturing capabilities in fully independent, self-contained Grade B and C cleanrooms for virus products.

'Sapere aude'

The optics has been very damaging to the EU. Well done!

— You know you're right (@YouareParsons) January 31, 2021

Today I met by VTC CEOs of companies manufacturing vaccines.

Objective: our new initiative to strengthen bio-defence preparedness.

We're discussing how to address Covid19 variants & scale up manufacturing, be better prepared for future pandemics. [_link]

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) January 31, 2021

New alliances for new solutions. This is what we will work for.

We need a new public-private approach to detect earlier, develop together & manufacture faster at scale.

This is true for pandemics or health. But also for all major societal challenges. #DavosAgenda pic.twitter.com/rjhDPAIC2P

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) January 26, 2021

"Biontech will 75 Millionen zusätzliche Dosen liefern
Allein für Deutschland soll es im Frühjahr knapp 14 Millionen Dosen mehr geben." Der Spiegel #COVID19 #BioNTech

Biontech firması bahara kadar 75 milyon daha fazla #Korona aşısı üretme sözü verdi🍀 pic.twitter.com/WZQeq9iJjm

— Av. Memet Kilic (@Memet_Kilic) February 1, 2021

Apparently the delivery of the existing order is pulled forward...

EU secures nearly half of Pfizer's 2021 global output of COVID-19 shots | Reuters - Jan. 8, 2021 |

'Sapere aude'

US drug giant Pfizer and German partner BioNTech have boosted their target for producing Covid-19 vaccine doses in 2021 by more than half.

In response to the exceedingly strong and urgent demand for the shot, the two companies said they were now aiming to supply as many as 2.0bn doses, up from plans for 1.3bn previously.

That increase includes a label change which will allow doctors to extract six doses instead of five from each vaccine vial.

...
Brussels had inked a deal with the two firms to purchase as many as 600m doses.

With that an aim in mind, a new production site in Marburg, Germany, with an expected annual production capacity of as many as 750m shots was expected to come online by the end of February.

BioNTech was also pushing to add suppliers and contract manufacturers to improve production processes.

COVID vaccine: BioNTech plans 2 billion doses this year | DW |

The Brexit avengers from Downing Street ...

Can you believe it? While demand and manufacturing doubled, the British aligned AstraZeneca cut the planning for the EU by nearly 70% ... intolerable ⁉️

'Sapere aude'

AstraZeneca says it will boost vaccine production to 2M a week | Politico - Jan. 15, 2021 |

Health authorities in the UK have decided to change their distribution strategy, prioritizing giving as many people a first shot as possible.

British drugmaker AstraZeneca says it will boost production of the coronavirus vaccine it developed with Oxford University to two million doses a week by the middle of January.

According to the Times, an unnamed member of the Oxford/AstraZeneca team said production was expected to reach a total of 1 million doses by the end of next week.

"The plan is then to build it up fairly rapidly -- by the third week of January we should get to two million a week," they added.

...

Meanwhile, a senior scientist from Oxford University has complained that the country's pharmaceutical manufacturing base is not prepared to handle the roll-out of the jab.

"The government has been completely disinterested in building onshore manufacturing capacity for any of the life-sciences products," said John Bell, professor of medicine at Oxford.

Simple math ... manufacturing rate of 52 million per year to double to 104 million 🚱 ... cutting corners to please the Brexiteers in the City.

Update on the vaccine supply issues & confusing govt lines on this 1/2 @ks_1968 [_link]

— Sarah Rosemary (@SarahRosemary3) January 2, 2021

Brazil's Bolsonaro says COVID-19 vaccinations won't be mandatory | NBC News - Sept. 4, 2020 |

Brazil last month signed an agreement with AstraZeneca to buy 30 million doses of the vaccine it is developing with Oxford University, with an option for 70 million more doses if the vaccine works.

Latin America's most populous country has become a key testing ground for a COVID-19 vaccines and has approved phase 3 clinical trials for four that are under development, by Oxford University/AstraZeneca, China's Sinovac Biotech, and Pfizer Inc in partnership with BioNTech and Johnson & Johnson's pharmaceutical subsidiary Janssen.

Bolsonaro entered a vaccine deal with a single supplier ... the British AstraZeneca ... rollout planning unknown and not sufficient to prevent harm for the Brazilian people.

'Sapere aude'

EU contract did not leave time to fix vaccine hiccups -AstraZeneca CEO

AstraZeneca's Chief Executive on Tuesday said the European Union's late decision to strike a contract with the drugmaker to supply COVID-19 vaccines, months after Britain, meant the company did not have enough time to iron out glitches in setting up production lines with external partners.

"We are basically two months behind where we wanted to be," Pascal Soriot told German daily Die Welt in an interview, when asked about delayed deliveries in Europe.

"And the issue here is we've had also teething issues like.this in the UK supply chain," he added. "As for Europe, we are three months behind in fixing those glitches."

...

In August last year, the EU agreed to purchase 300 million doses of AstraZeneca's vaccine for 750 million euros, with an option for an additional 100 million.

That was after Britain in May secured 100 million doses for 84 million pounds and the United States, also that month, secured 300 million doses for up to $1.2 billion.

Soriot, however, said the volumes agreed with the EU were not binding.

Never ever read so many much Bull in a short article ... ‼️

That's best effort??

Purchase price
EU €2.50
UK £0.84
US $4.-
I'm sure the above doesn't tell the whole story of the contract. AstraZeneca has excellent outsource partners in Europe ... it seems more likely the vaccine didn't perform or met FDA Standards ... yet ... thus no build-up of stock.

FDA: COVID-19 vaccines in development - Jan. 15, 2021

'Sapere aude'

Health Minister de Jonge wants to investigate possible double count of vaccination

On Sunday, the corona dashboard, the government's official website showing the number of administered vaccines, estimated that 346,790 people have thus far been inoculated. However, only 226,298 injections were reported the day before. 

Some explanation from colleague Health Minister de Jonge:

... this is due to the new way in which the number of vaccinations is being calculated. "it takes a while before an injection is registered. We are now looking at how many vaccines have actually been administered, and we take an x percentage of that per day," said Minister de Jonge. 

On Sunday, he also said that figures were often incomplete because many general practitioners, hospitals, and long-term care institutions often only process their figures later. There would therefore be an under-reporting of the actual number of vaccinations. 

Really what Hugo meant to say, the official administrations of the RIVM and local GGDs are a complete ... ehh mess.

The percentage x is based an a higher calculus algorithm presupposed as a derivative of the undercount of the number of deaths due to SARS CoV-2 novel virus. One takes the inverse of 5O% undercount of deaths and multiply the result with the assumption of the number of jabs. This correction will look much better for Mark's PR as he approaches the next virtual meeting with leaders of the EU-27. The Dutch people still place their trust in him, Merkel and Macron can't wait to be rid of him ... either by self-imposed retirement or election loss to Le Pen.

'Sapere aude'

NEW--Interim analysis of Russian #COVID19 #vaccine phase 3 trial involving nearly 20,000 participants suggests a two-dose regimen has an efficacy of 91.6% against symptomatic #COVID19. No serious adverse events were deemed to be associated with vaccination. [_link] pic.twitter.com/Hzrs34uCWr

— The Lancet (@TheLancet) February 2, 2021

Data shows #SputnikV is 1 of the 3 vaccines in the world with efficacy over 90% and 100% protection from severe cases. Other advantages - storage temperature, proven safety and cost - make it a vaccine for all humankind. Already registered in 16 countries. New registrations daily pic.twitter.com/tePHrw51XF

— Sputnik V (@sputnikvaccine) February 2, 2021

Covid world map: which countries have the most coronavirus vaccinations, cases and deaths? [_link]

— The Guardian (@guardian) February 2, 2021

United Kingdom Daily Coronavirus (COVID-19) Report · Tuesday 2nd February.

16,840 new cases (people positive) reported, giving a total of 3,852,623.

1,449 new deaths reported, giving a total of 108,013. pic.twitter.com/5eACdQQQrX

— UK COVID-19 (@UKCovid19Stats) February 2, 2021

Obituary: Captain Sir Tom Moore, a hero who gave a nation hope amid the Covid pandemic [_link]

— BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) February 2, 2021

Johnson is on the crest of a vaccine wave. Labour will just have to ride it out | Martin Kettle [_link]

— Guardian Opinion (@guardianopinion) February 3, 2021

Tweet of the day 👇🏻 [_link]

— Oksana Pyzik (@OksanaPyzikUCL) February 4, 2021

Also true for outbreak management during #ebola 2014 & #zika 2015 [_link]

— Oksana Pyzik (@OksanaPyzikUCL) February 4, 2021

... and Dutch PM Mark Rutte a step behind the policy set by BoJo and Trump ... so sad!

'Sapere aude'

The UK has vaccinated more than 10 million people - the third-highest rate behind Israel and the UAE - after assembling the biggest vaccine stockpile per capita last year.

The Tory method: cutting corners and cheating. 😎

'Sapere aude'

The growing Brexit threat to Ireland

EU Commission's NI Border Blunder

One security source predicted it would take strong leadership to undo the damage caused by the commission's article 16 blunder. The source said the EU had always tried to occupy the moral high ground, insisting it would do every everything to protect the Good Friday agreement "and then they go and trigger 16, which blew everything out of the water.

"How do you get back to a position where the adults in the room are acting in a way that brings more stability and not undermining what little stability there is."

Btw the Dutch too don't get their British goods delivered ... one importer had a delivery of Scot's whiskey delayed by four weeks. In the end helping out to fill in the necessary forms ...

Nissan forced to shut UK production line owing to supply delays

British business leaders warn of 'substantial difficulties' at UK ports

'Sapere aude'

Oxford/AstraZeneca jab fails to prevent mild and moderate Covid from S African strain, study shows

The Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine does not appear to offer protection against mild and moderate disease caused by the viral variant first identified in South Africa, according to a study.
Although none of the more than 2,000 mainly healthy and young patients in the study died or was hospitalised, the findings, which have not yet been peer reviewed, could complicate the race to roll out vaccines as new strains emerge.

In both the human trials and tests on the blood of those vaccinated, the jab showed significantly reduced efficacy against the 501Y.V2 viral variant, which is dominant in South Africa, according to the randomised, double-blind study seen by the Financial Times.

Johnson & Johnson vaccine: Multi-continent Study Provides Clinical Data on Multiple Emerging Viral Mutations

'Sapere aude'

EU to seek more time to ratify Brexit trade deal amid tensions with UK [_link]

— The Guardian (@guardian) February 9, 2021