The self-destructive struggle for vaccines in Europe – WSJ

Europe, the USA and the UK have orders or options for approximately the same number of doses per capita. But the United States and the United Kingdom acted more quickly to secure contracts, which made it easier for pharmaceutical companies to prepare. Washington and London also spent about seven times as much on development, production and purchases per person, according to British analytics firm Airfinity. Some states in the U.S. face distribution challenges like many European countries, but American and British regulators have approved vaccines faster than their EU counterparts.

The results are already clear. In our Thursday deadline, the UK administered doses to more than 11% of residents, while the US was approaching 8%. Denmark was a European success story with 3.7%, while France and Sweden languished around 2%.

This did not inspire much reflection in Brussels. EU mandarins spent this week admonishing AstraZeneca after the company announced that problems with production at a European factory meant it would deliver tens of millions of doses less than expected this quarter. The European Commission ordered an operation at the AstraZeneca plant in Belgium on Wednesday.

“At the time, Europe wanted to be supplied at roughly the same time as the UK, although the contract was signed three months later,” AstraZeneca chief Pascal Soriot told an Italian newspaper this week. “So we said, ‘OK, let’s do our best, let’s try, but we can’t contractually commit because we’re three months behind the UK'”

EU health commissioner Stella Kyriakides said the contract requires vaccines to be diverted from UK factories to Europe. The company must publish the agreement and let the public judge who is telling the truth. But this ugly episode is good propaganda for Brexit.

By the way, London gave the green light for the AstraZeneca vaccine in December. German officials decided on Thursday that the vaccine should not be given to people over 64, and an EU decision is not expected until Friday.

Brussels will soon give national governments the power to block the export of millions of vaccine doses from Europe. These restrictions are bound to backfire as other countries retaliate against Europe and complex supply chains disintegrate.

Brussels is demonstrating its unique talent for shooting itself in the foot, turning its vaccine incompetence crisis into deeper economic damage. The EU’s main challenge after the reflux of the pandemic will be to revive economic growth despite decades of political mismanagement. However, nothing says “closed for business” like harassing companies that offer life-saving medical treatments.