Israel is expected to hold talks with Austria and Denmark about the partnership for the manufacture of vaccines against coronavirus, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday.
Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen plan to visit Israel on Thursday to discuss “an international vaccine manufacturing corporation,” said Netanyahu, quoted by Reuters.
The action of Austrian and Danish leaders is the latest blow to the EU’s vaccination strategy, arriving on the same day that Poland ordered vaccines from China and Slovakia ordered 2 million doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine, and just one day after Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán received his first dose of the Chinese Sinopharm vaccine, which was not approved by the European Medicines Agency.
Kurz told German news site Bild that Austria and Denmark no longer want to “just” depend on the EU for vaccines, citing the block’s manufacturing problems and the slow EMA approval process.
“We agreed in the summer that EU vaccines for member states would be purchased in good time and approved quickly,” said Kurz. “Although this approach was fundamentally correct, EMA is very slow in approving vaccines and there are bottlenecks in the delivery of pharmaceutical companies.”
Frederiksen was more careful at a news conference on Monday, saying that negotiations with Israel do not mean a lack of confidence in the EU, but adding that countries need to do everything they can to increase vaccine production.
“We may very well be in a situation where we not only have to vaccinate, but also re-vaccinate, maybe once a year … That’s why we need to dramatically increase vaccine production,” said Frederiksen, according to the Financial Times .
The FT also said that leaders are discussing the creation of vaccine stocks, citing authorities in Austria and Copenhagen.
The European Commission was unable to comment immediately.