BRUSSELS – The European Union is finalizing emergency legislation that will give it broad powers to curb exports in the next six weeks of Covid-19 vaccines manufactured in the bloc, a sharp escalation in its response to the scarcity of domestic supplies that created a political turmoil amidst to a third rising wave on the continent.
The bill, due to be made public on Wednesday, was reviewed by The New York Times and confirmed by two EU officials involved in the drafting process. The new rules will make it more difficult for pharmaceutical companies that produce Covid-19 vaccines in the European Union to export them and are likely to stop supply to Britain.
The European Union has been at odds with AstraZeneca since it drastically cut off supplies to the bloc, citing production problems in January, and the company is the main target of the new rules. But the legislation, which could block the export of millions of doses from EU ports, could also affect Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.
Britain is by far the biggest benefactor of EU exports and will lose the most from these rules, but they can also be applied to restrict exports to other countries like Canada, for example, the second largest recipient of vaccines made in the EU, as well as Israel, which receives the doses of the bloc, but is very advanced in its vaccination campaign and, therefore, is seen as less needy.
“We are in the crisis of the century. And I’m not ruling out anything for now, because we have to ensure that Europeans are vaccinated as soon as possible, ”said Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, in comments last week that paved the way for the new rules. “Human lives, civil liberties and also the prosperity of our economy depend on this, on the speed of vaccination, on moving forward.”
The legislation is unlikely to affect the United States, which has so far received less than a million doses of EU-based facilities.
The Biden government said it had ensured sufficient doses from its three authorized manufacturers – Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson – to cover all adults in the country by the end of May. Most of that supply comes from factories in the United States. The country also exports vaccine components to the European Union, which is reluctant to risk any interruption in the raw material supply chain.
The European Union has allowed pharmaceutical companies to fulfill their contracts, authorizing them to export more than 40 million doses of vaccines to 33 countries between February and mid-March, 10 million to Great Britain and 4.3 million to the United Kingdom. Canada. The bloc kept around 70 million at home and distributed them to its 27 member countries, but its efforts to mount mass vaccination campaigns were hampered by a series of missteps.
Exporting liberally abroad when domestic supply is scarce has been a fundamental part of the problem, and the bloc was criticized for allowing exports in the first place, when the United States and Britain practically blocked domestic production for domestic use by through contracts with pharmaceutical companies.
The result was a problematic launch of vaccines for the richest group of nations in the world. The impact of the failures is being exacerbated by a third wave that is putting health systems across the continent in an emergency mode and initiating new painful blocks.
The European Commission, which ordered the vaccines, and the individual governments of the member states responsible for their national campaigns have been severely criticized for their failures by voters tired of blockades and the growing number of Covid-19 cases. Public anger and its political cost have increased as the bloc has lagged behind several peers in the wealthy world in advancing vaccination campaigns, despite being home to major manufacturers.
The bloc saw vaccine containers produced in its member countries, as well as in other wealthy nations, move forward with its inoculation campaigns. Nearly 60 percent of Israelis received at least one dose of vaccine, 40 percent of Britons and a quarter of Americans, but only 10 percent of EU citizens were vaccinated, according to the latest information published by Our World in Data.
Export restrictions are being pushed by the European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, and although changes to the new rules may still take place before the law is finalized, officials said it is unlikely to be substantive. They are expected to be put into effect quickly.
EU officials said the rules would allow for a certain degree of discretion, meaning that they would not result in a general export ban, and the authorities still hoped that many exports would continue.
“The proposed measures are worrisome,” said Youmy Han, a spokesman for Canada’s Minister of International Trade, Mary Ng.
“Minister Ng’s counterparts have repeatedly assured her that these measures will not affect vaccine shipments to Canada,” said Han. She added: “We will continue to work with the EU and its member states, as we did during the pandemic, to ensure that our essential health and medical supply chains remain open and resilient.”
Canada depends on the European Union for almost all of its vaccine supply: all of Canada’s Moderna and Pfizer vaccines came from Europe, although the country received a small shipment of the AstraZeneca vaccine from India.
The new rules come after months of escalating tensions between the European Union and AstraZeneca, in a situation that has become toxic to the bloc’s fragile relations with its recently deceased member, Britain.
The problem started in late January, when AstraZeneca told the bloc that it would cut its deliveries by more than half in the first quarter of 2021, halting vaccine deployment plans. In response, the European Union implemented an export authorization process, requiring pharmaceutical companies to apply for permission to export vaccines and giving the European Union powers to block them if they were found to be contrary to the company’s contractual obligations to the bloc.
Since February 1, the European Union has blocked only one of more than 300 exports, a small consignment of AstraZeneca vaccines to Australia, on the grounds that the country was almost free of Covid while the bloc was fighting an increase in infections.
The new rules will introduce more reasons to block exports, preliminary documents show. They will encourage blocking shipments to countries that do not export vaccines to the European Union – a clause clearly aimed at Great Britain – or to countries that have “a higher vaccination rate” than the European Union “or where the current epidemiological situation is less serious “than in the bloc, according to The Times newsroom.
In the past few days, Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson has tried to adopt a conciliatory tone in an attempt to avoid an EU export ban that would be a major blow to his country’s rapidly advancing vaccination campaign.
At a news conference on Tuesday, Johnson said he was opposed to the blockades and was “encouraged by some of the things I heard from the continent”. British media reported that his government would be prepared to allow the bloc to produce four million doses of AstraZeneca in a factory based in the EU.
Benjamin Mueller contributed reporting from London, Sharon LaFraniere of Washington and Ian Austen Ottawa.