EU: WE MADE BIG MISTAKE ON VACCINES
Gove declares UK victory after Brussels climbdown
BRITAIN yesterday declared victory in the astonishing vaccine war – as the EU pledged: We won’t try it on again.
Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove said the EU recognised it had made a “mistake” and added: “The European Union has stepped back.”
He and EU vice-president Maros Sefcovic held peace talks in which they thrashed out a Brexit reboot.
Mr Gove said: “We both agreed that we need a reset, that we need to put the people of Northern Ireland first. We’re confident we can proceed with our vaccine programmes as planned.
“We have assurances that the supply we have procured, the supply we have paid for, is going to be delivered.”
The EU had threatened to block vaccines to Northern Ireland to stop them getting into mainland Britain.
The climbdown began in Friday night talks between PM Boris Johnson and Commission president Ursula von der Leyen after furious backlashes in London, Dublin and Belfast. Ms Von der Leyen tweeted: “We agreed there should not be restrictions on the export of vaccines.” It means supplies of Pfizer vaccines made in Belgium and bound for
Britain will not be disrupted. Whitehall sources said there had been no deal to give the EU any of our vaccine. And Mr Gove stressed we will only help the EU once our population is protected.
Yesterday the UK death toll rose 1,200 to 105,571. The EU’s threat would have meant overriding a Brexit deal which keeps Northern Ireland in the single market. It would have meant new border checks between the province and the Republic.
The row blew up after Oxford-AstraZeneca supplies to the EU were cut by 60% until April over production problems. Pfizer say they are still on track to deliver 40 million doses to Britain by the end of the year.
AZ is supplying two million doses a week. Its boss Pascal Soriot said there is total protection against serious disease and hospitalisation after one jab. And the UK’s deputy chief medical officer, Professor Jonathan Van-Tam, has said: “Evidence shows vaccinated individuals get almost complete protection after the first dose.”
Contracts expert Gerd Kerkhoff said the EU’s deal with AZ was a “declaration of intent”, was “as soft as butter” – and could not be enforced.