Only French get jab as pharma boss accuses EU of failing to order enough doses...
SQUABBLING politicians across the EU are facing public wrath amid mounting criticism of the sluggish rollout of vaccines across the 27-member bloc.
The scandal of a botched ordering system causing a worrying shortage of doses is summed up by the shocking fact that only 352 people in France have so far received a Covid vaccination.
According to the French health ministry’s most recent data, 0.0005 per cent of the population has been given the jab, placing it among the worst-performing countries in the world.
Gerald Kierzek, a leading French doctor, described the debacle as another example of the nation’s health service being stymied by bureaucracy.
Meanwhile, German firm BioNTech, which produced the first vaccine to be approved in Britain, criticised the EU bloc as a whole for failing to order more of its jab, which was developed with the US pharmaceutical firm Pfizer.
While the US ordered more than 600 million doses of the BioNTech-Pfizer jab in July, the EU waited until November to place an order for just half that amount.
BioNTech’s Turkish-German co-founder Ugur Sahin said the EU’s ordering process ‘certainly did not go as fast and smooth as it did with other countries’. He described the situation as ‘currently not rosy’ as it emerged that the EU had wrongly assumed several different vaccines would be ready at once.
‘It would seem that the impression was, “We’ll get enough, it won’t be so bad, and we have this under control.” It surprised me,’ he said.
The EU pre-ordered around two billion doses from various pharmaceutical companies but not all of its bets paid off, with some vaccines proving to be ineffective.
The EU ordered up to 300 million from BioNTech- Pfizer, the only vaccine producers so far to have been approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA). That is insufficient for the EU’s population of 446 million, with t wo shots required per person.
There has been fighting between nations. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has faced criticism for not securing enough vaccines – having had to order an additional 30 million doses – only to come under fire from the Italian government for breaking an agreement for the EU to buy the vaccine as a bloc.
Britain, which declined the EU’s invitation to join its procurement programme last July, was independently able to authorise vaccines speedily thanks to emergency powers.
And while most EU countries adopted a co-ordinated approach, Hungary defied the EMA by purchasing doses of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine. US biotech firm Moderna’s vaccine is likely to be approved by the EU next week, providing up to 160 million more shots, but the Oxford-A st raZe ne ca vaccine, 400 million doses of which have been ordered by the EU, is unlikely to be approved until next month.
French government spokesman Gabriel Attal defended the pace of France’s rollout, insisting it was targeting care homes for the elderly and was ‘not going to judge a vaccination campaign that will last six months on a few days’.
I n hi s New Year’s address, President Emmanuel Macron said he would ‘ not let an unjustified slowness take hold’, adding: ‘Every French person who wants to must be able to get vaccinated.’
Health minister Olivier Veran, who has been accused of pandering to anti-vaxxers and dragging his heels, said last week the vaccine would be available earlier than planned to older health workers.
France recorded 19,348 new cases on Friday, taking its total to 2.64 million since the pandemic began.
Germany is also under pressure to step up vaccinations after the most recent figures, from last Saturday to Wednesday, showed 131,626 citizens had received the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine.
However, Germany’s system has been beset by teething problems, with several areas – including Berlin and Bavaria – complaining that batches they were due to receive were cancelled with no explanation.
Dilek Kalayci, Berlin’s health minister, said that because of the glitch the city would be unable to begin vaccinating people in their 80s until the second half of January. Leading doctors have also complained that the failure to vaccinate them has left them vulnerable to catching the virus.
Carola Holzner, chief physician in the A&E department of Essen University Hospital in western Germany, said: ‘We were rightly put at the top of the list for the distribution of vaccines. Now it’s here. But
‘They thought: We’ll get enough, it’ll be OK’ ‘We can’t let unjustified slowness take hold’
were we for some reason not considered? Were we forgotten? Did we fall victim to other priorities?’
National health minister Jens Spahn said he had received complaints about people not getting quick enough access to BioNTech’s vaccine, despite it being made in Germany. He admitted that there had been ‘niggles here and there’ but promised the situation would improve ‘step by step’.
Italy has vaccinated 8,300 people and Spain said it expected to have given 1.3 million doses by Thursday.