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If you listen to UK BBC news, they spend half of their airtime saying how the UK government placed the order months before the EU, and that the EU is in the wro

If you listen to UK BBC news, they spend half of their airtime saying how the UK government placed the order months before the EU, and that the EU is in the wrong, since they haven't even approved the vaccine yet(as of the last time I listened to the BBC news), so they shouldn't complain and so on. I am surprised by the polarization and demonization of the EU they are promoting. Was not expecting that from BBC. And then they wonder why British people voted for Brexit.

pasabagi 6y ago
It's hard to overstate how tight the british establishment is, media included. It's a small country, and power is concentrated in a vanishingly small number of hands, many of whom are married, or went to school together, or are close friends. This is why when britain passed 100,000 coronavirus deaths, with the worst death rate in the world, nobody resigned, and nobody called for anybody to resign. The BBC is part of this kind of tight, teflon kernel that's at the heart of why the UK is such a dysfunctional country these days.
- isbvhodnvemrwvn 6y ago
  Very relevant "Yes, Minister"; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9tzoGFszog https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9tzoGFszog
- subsubzero 6y ago
  > It's a small country, and power is concentrated in a vanishingly small number of hands This is very true, I chatted at length with my neighbor who lived his entire life in the UK(up to a few years ago) and was shocked how stratified the society is. Basically there is small group of people(who went to Eton, are lords or knighted, from famous families) that form a clique that runs everything in the country. No matter how much money you make or how successful you are, you can never join that circle. An example was told to me that even David Beckham (famous soccer star) is looked down upon by that segment and does not associate with them and could never join that part of society.
  - mattmanser 6y ago
    Err, same in America man. Bushes? Father and son were the president. Kennedys? Brothers were almost presidents, one was a President, the other governor. Clintons? Spouses were almost presidents! If that's not cliquey I don't know what is. Your mate is also massively over-egging how bad it is, there is still an Eton clique (the present/last government being a good example), but we've had a range of recent prime minister's educated normally, outside of the Eton clique. Brown, Blair, even Thatcher just went to a Grammar school (generally a better school you have to pass exams to qualify for, which is semi-meritocratic, though gamed by the rich) Our election system is even worse than America's though so we keep getting conservative governments who win 40-45% of the popular vote but somehow get landslide majorities. Also, what do you mean by "small", it's got 70 million inhabitants. At worst a country with a population of a size of France and Germany might be called "medium".
    - kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
      The people who really control things in the US aren't politicians. That is way beneath the scions of multi-generational wealth. Even T* isn't in their club.
      - Nasrudith 6y ago
        If anybody thinks they are really in control of things they are highly arrogant and out of touch at best or an outright delusional at worst. Especially when it comes to the US. Where even the overly rigid minutae obsessed military take pride in being considered unpredictable madmen who don't even pay attention to their own doctrines consistently and are at home in chaos. The people of the US aren't even consistently individualistic and would make herding cats look easy - you can get them to follow you with a tin of tuna. There isn't "the" Man. Why would there be when even positions of petty power are contested for so tightly and dirtily and there are so many striving to rise? Consequences are not a strong deterrent - if they were the world would look very different. Wealthy individuals may have power but nobody has control over the a process of contention across all layers with nominal goals served imperfectly with cargo-culting and skewed priorities. All of this and there is nothing inherently special about the people - human nature and control oppose each other.
JumpCrisscross 6y ago
As a (Swiss) American, I can't see the flaw in that logic. The UK signed first, is paying more and included a provision preventing the export of British-manufactured doses. The EU didn't. The EU also added a provision mandating AstraZeneca make no profit prior to 1 July 2021 (the end of the Pandemic Period), a counter-incentive to ramping up production. It's not fair. But neither is the UK and EU getting wildly more doses per capita than Africa, South America or Oceania.
- kitd 6y ago
  Tbf, I believe the "no profit" clause comes from Oxford university, the IP owner.
- radiator 6y ago
  Why on Earth is it not fair that the UK and EU get more doses of their own vaccines per capita than Africa, South America or Oceania? Why would they be obliged to export even one dose of something they produced, before they have provided for every single one of their citizens?
  - JumpCrisscross 6y ago
    > Why on Earth is it not fair that the UK and EU get more doses of their own vaccines per capita than Africa, South America or Oceania? My point is fairness is in the eye of the beholder. What we're left with are contracts. And contractually, AstraZeneca seems to be in the right. The EU negotiated, at first glance (and to this non-expert), a poor agreement.
    - Isinlor 6y ago
      Under international trade agreements we (EU) can also stop exports of the vaccines as did UK in the contracts. Whatever the means, as long as they are legal, we can and should force equal burden of delays. I guess EU didn't play it the best way from political perspective, since we are now labeled as bad. Still, I'm personally impressed that EU is actually able to do something of consequence in somewhat short time frame.
oliwarner 6y ago
They spend half their time talking to their government, who say that. The BBC can't win. When they editorialise to try to dig into a subject, it's left wing pandering, and when they just listen to official sources, they're right wing mouthpieces.
- simonswords82 6y ago
  True that - which is why it's so important to obtain news from multiple sources and then attempt to form your own view.
bitcharmer 6y ago
I don't understand, where is BBC incorrect here? How would you like them to report on this? EU was months late and they move much slower than other parties in the whole process and on top of that they signed agreements with "best effort" clauses instead of hard obligation of vaccine delivery. How is this UK's fault?
- DangerousPie 6y ago
  Nobody is saying it's the UK's fault, but just because they signed the agreement a few months later doesn't mean that AZ isn't bound to that agreement. There is no "first come first serve" clause in there.
  - adrianb 6y ago
    Interesting. How are these contracts supposed to work? In general when I buy something and have to wait, I expect to get it before everyone who buys after me. Not sure how these contracts work.
    - krona 6y ago
      Which is exactly why AZ split the UK/EU supply chain to try avoid such issues entirely (CEOs words.) The contract is vague and nonspecific about commiting UK factories to supply the EU. The whole thing is a parody of Brussels bureaucratism.
      - mrtksn 6y ago
        >The contract is vague and nonspecific about the UK factories supplying the EU. It's not, it's clearly stated that the contract covers the UK facilities. Check article 5.4
        krona 6y ago
        My interpretation comes from 2 seperate lawyers. Why are they wrong?
alibarber 6y ago
But surely the EU hasn't exactly covered itself in glory here? They, factually, objectively, _were_ later in signing an agreement, and have taken longer to approve a vaccine in use elsewhere in the world. Why should they not share some blame from their citizens like any other politician should? The UK government deserves scorn for their handling of the pandemic in the UK. The EU should be criticised for this. It is not a football match. We do not need to 'support' one 'side' against the other.
- GizmoSwan 6y ago
  There is/was issues with submitted vaccine data. Technically it wouldn't have been approved in normal times till they could get better proven data. Now it is all water under the bridge because countries are desperate to have enough vaccines. 6 months from now, all countries are going to pretend to be nice nice and when there will be oversupply and new variant of the COVID, they will be dumping the old vaccines on other countries.
- alibarber 6y ago
  Instead of downvoting - please do tell me what is offensive, or how you feel this does not add to the discussion. Or at least do both.
GizmoSwan 6y ago
Every country is for itself when shit hits ceiling, that is my conclusion. Territorial dogma took over with PPP and respirators too. Now the Swiss and Brits are not part of EU and their own interest supersedes their alliance with EU obviously.
- jack_riminton 6y ago
  Nitpicking but the phrase is "shit hits the fan" i.e. it would go everywhere Shit hitting the ceiling wouldn't be that dramatic in comparison :)
  - GizmoSwan 6y ago
    LOL yup...
salicideblock 6y ago
I am surprised why anyone is discussing who signed first, given that in the contract AstraZeneca warrants that: "it is not under any obligation, contractual or otherwise, to any Person or third party in respect of the Initial Europe Doses or that conflicts with or is inconsistent in any material respect with the terms of this Agreement or that would impede the complete fulfillment of its obligations under this Agreement;" This ended up not being true, which was not totally unexpected. AstraZeneca ends up in the bad position of choosing on which of their contracts their will fail, and they evidently chose to fail the EU's in its near totality for the next few months. It pains me to see the cynicism in shielding behind "best effort" clauses (standard in any procurement under R&D) or in "who came first". It's a serious matter that warrants a cooler and more balanced solution that this.
- JumpCrisscross 6y ago
  > in respect of the Initial Europe Doses There is text blacked out in the definition of Initial Europe Doses after "within the EU" that I'm curious about. Also, the clause reads "AstraZeneca has committed to use Best Reasonable Efforts...to build capacity to manufacture 300 million Doses of the Vaccine...for distribution within the EU..." That's ambiguous with respect to distribution. AstraZeneca are using Best Reasonable Efforts to build this manufacturing capacity. But they aren't under Best Reasonable Efforts obligations to use this capacity for the EU. (The definition of Best Reasonable Efforts overlooks distribution entirely.) It's a shitty situation. Pain has to be allocated. But based on contract, versus loose notions of fairness, AstraZeneca is under no obligation to export British-made doses to the EU.
  - hef19898 6y ago
    AZis only obliged to deliver to hubs in each member state. That's it, nothing else. Hubs have to take the delivery within 5 days of being notofied of that delivery. That's about it regarding actual deliveries. Pretty thin, especially compared to the 4 pages covering the order form.
  - throwawaymanbot 6y ago
    well ok. Let them return all the money the EU gave them. And let them understand how AZ might have market access problems to the EU from now on.
gutnor 6y ago
That was the same in the Touring Visa that for a while was "The EU refused" and it became just the opposite a few weeks later. But that's the story of Brexit and its 40 years of media support. Even the BBC has often been on the technically correct side happily reporting welcome change as "UK change" and blaming unwelcome on the EU, even if the UK voted for it.
calpaterson 6y ago
Those are the simple facts and they are pretty operative: - The UK signed months before - The EU has been slow to vaccinate independent of that AZ dispute - The EMA did only approve this vaccine (which the UK is already using) a few hours ago This dispute has sadly been made into a hugely sensitive national dispute as a distraction from the poor performance of the EU's vaccination programme. Even if nothing had gone wrong with the AZ vaccine production, the EU still would have much poorer rollout than the UK. It's just a cover of jingoism.
- agd 6y ago
  Not sure why you've been downvoted. It seems very clear that the commission is whipping up a political storm here to deflect from the fact it's done a bad job with vaccine procurement, which will cost thousands of European lives.
  - calpaterson 6y ago
    It takes a certain bravery to post any opinion that is critical of the EU on HN. Always a danger to your karma :)
  - hef19898 6y ago
    I don't see procurement as the main issue. The EU ordered around 2.3 billion doses, for 450 million inhabitants. Quantity wise, that's more than enough. They did screw up distrbution so, royaly. And with distribution being the responsbility of the member states, well go figure. This contract has its defiencies, I really hate it that there are n consequences when delivery schedules aren't met. And how delivery schedules will be defined.
    - agd 6y ago
      It wasn't the total quantity that was the problem. It was the timing. It's no use having hundreds of millions of doses if they aren't available until Q4.
      - 6y ago
YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
It's the same if you read the Guardian. It's clear that the apparent europhilia of some liberal media was nothing but a political play. They pretended to support Europe only because their rivals, the Tory-supporting media, were against it. Or pretended to be. None of those people believe anything at all.
- btbuilder 6y ago
  or perhaps they are jointly shocked to see the EU behave in this way and are providing opinion on this one issue rather than sticking to a predetermined side?
  - YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
    "Genuinely" shocked, you mean? I'm speaking of a more general trend I've observed, not connected to the AstraZeneca fiasco. It's difficult to give examples, but to my mind and given my prior experience with Guardian articles, it seems to me that there's a clear de-escalation of partisanship in EU-related news.
kcartlidge 6y ago
I'm British. I do however believe we should vaccinate the most at risk groups, then be more generous with the UK production facilities for the EU's more at risk groups whilst slowing down our efforts for our own less at risk ones (which includes me). It's the humane thing to do. That said, my sympathy for the EU (as an opponent of Brexit) has been diminished by their attempted bullying behaviour. They initially wanted the UK in on their EU procurement. Unlike the EU members of the grouping we were to be excluded from any say in the vaccines chosen, the quantities, the pricing, the manufacturing, and the distribution. No say on anything; take what you're given. They left us with no choice but to do our own deals. We did those deals faster and with less guarantees at that early stage, fronted virtually the whole cost of the AstraZeneca UK production, accepted liability rather than insisting (as per the EU) that the vaccine makers did, and paid much more, just to get a faster agreement (and we still had the same teething issues the EU are facing now; we weren't special in that regard). Despite all that risk, up front cost, higher prices, and accepted liability, the EU is now demanding that the instant they approve the vaccine they can dip into the supply that has cost the UK far more than most people realise we gave up in order to get that swift delivery. The EU stumbled by not realising the urgency last year, then stumbled again by badly insulting the UK with the EU procurement "offer" terms which forced us to negotiate separately. I have a great amount of sympathy for the EU people (I may not be in the EU any more, but I'm still European) but none of this is the doing of the UK - who are simply carrying on using the vaccines delivered - and the first 'shot' at actual vaccine nationalism has been fired not by the mad brexiteers but by the EU with their Northern Ireland border statements and not-export-control-really new 'monitoring' and 'agreement' position. I really expected coming into this year to find myself part of a massive UK villain state facing a more reasonable EU. I didn't foresee a desparate EU attacking a UK just going about it's own business.
- senko 6y ago
  As a EU citizen, I agree with your assessment completely. The EU bungled this and it would not be fair if we were to bully our way out of it. It's sad to see this being a zero sum game, and no way you cut it people are going to suffer (already are) somewhere. I was expecting a bit more decency on our side. Shattered superiority complex after Brits mismanaged Brexit, maybe? Our lack of coordination and flailing in this regard is equally impressive.
oli5679 6y ago
The capacity to manufacture it in UK was developed by a UK government grant that was issued in May and a UK government order that was issued soon after. It is being produced at cost by AstraZeneca. The UK acted quickly, realising that each week of lockdown costs a similar amount to their entire vaccine expenditure. They got scientific advice and backed a range of different technologies. Meanwhile the EU acted bureaucratically and treated this like a procurement exercise, squabbling about spending and placing orders in December. It is now scapegoating andsuing a company that is producing the vaccine at cost. GSK has every inventive to scale up capacity and produce as many doses as possible, and has no profit motive to divert doses. It is simply abiding by its agreement with the UK to use UK funded capacity to supply the country first, whilst making best efforts to iron out kinks for European orders. https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-coronavirus-vaccine-struggle-pfizer-biontech-astrazeneca/ https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-coronavirus-vaccine-s...
breakfastduck 6y ago
I've never seen such an anti EU reaction both domestically (UK) and internationally. You try and imply the BBC has been pro brexit - but seriously, this is by far the most hostile the liberal UK media has been to the EU in a long time.
- timellis-smith 6y ago
  You don't think that threatening a trade war, threatening to break the NI agreement which was a red-line for the EU, blaming the British for your failures and closing off vaccine exports to the UK warrants a degree of hostility? Edit: Also spreading fake news about the efficacy of the drug. I suspect if the EU were to invade the UK, you would still be attacking the UK press for outrage.
  - breakfastduck 6y ago
    Erm, are you replying to the right person? I frankly dislike the EU and am thoroughly enjoying them make such an ass of themselves.

pasabagi 6y ago

It's hard to overstate how tight the british establishment is, media included. It's a small country, and power is concentrated in a vanishingly small number of hands, many of whom are married, or went to school together, or are close friends. This is why when britain passed 100,000 coronavirus deaths, with the worst death rate in the world, nobody resigned, and nobody called for anybody to resign. The BBC is part of this kind of tight, teflon kernel that's at the heart of why the UK is such a dysfunctional country these days.

isbvhodnvemrwvn 6y ago
Very relevant "Yes, Minister"; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9tzoGFszog https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9tzoGFszog
subsubzero 6y ago
> It's a small country, and power is concentrated in a vanishingly small number of hands This is very true, I chatted at length with my neighbor who lived his entire life in the UK(up to a few years ago) and was shocked how stratified the society is. Basically there is small group of people(who went to Eton, are lords or knighted, from famous families) that form a clique that runs everything in the country. No matter how much money you make or how successful you are, you can never join that circle. An example was told to me that even David Beckham (famous soccer star) is looked down upon by that segment and does not associate with them and could never join that part of society.
- mattmanser 6y ago
  Err, same in America man. Bushes? Father and son were the president. Kennedys? Brothers were almost presidents, one was a President, the other governor. Clintons? Spouses were almost presidents! If that's not cliquey I don't know what is. Your mate is also massively over-egging how bad it is, there is still an Eton clique (the present/last government being a good example), but we've had a range of recent prime minister's educated normally, outside of the Eton clique. Brown, Blair, even Thatcher just went to a Grammar school (generally a better school you have to pass exams to qualify for, which is semi-meritocratic, though gamed by the rich) Our election system is even worse than America's though so we keep getting conservative governments who win 40-45% of the popular vote but somehow get landslide majorities. Also, what do you mean by "small", it's got 70 million inhabitants. At worst a country with a population of a size of France and Germany might be called "medium".
  - kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
    The people who really control things in the US aren't politicians. That is way beneath the scions of multi-generational wealth. Even T* isn't in their club.
    - Nasrudith 6y ago
      If anybody thinks they are really in control of things they are highly arrogant and out of touch at best or an outright delusional at worst. Especially when it comes to the US. Where even the overly rigid minutae obsessed military take pride in being considered unpredictable madmen who don't even pay attention to their own doctrines consistently and are at home in chaos. The people of the US aren't even consistently individualistic and would make herding cats look easy - you can get them to follow you with a tin of tuna. There isn't "the" Man. Why would there be when even positions of petty power are contested for so tightly and dirtily and there are so many striving to rise? Consequences are not a strong deterrent - if they were the world would look very different. Wealthy individuals may have power but nobody has control over the a process of contention across all layers with nominal goals served imperfectly with cargo-culting and skewed priorities. All of this and there is nothing inherently special about the people - human nature and control oppose each other.

JumpCrisscross 6y ago

As a (Swiss) American, I can't see the flaw in that logic. The UK signed first, is paying more and included a provision preventing the export of British-manufactured doses. The EU didn't. The EU also added a provision mandating AstraZeneca make no profit prior to 1 July 2021 (the end of the Pandemic Period), a counter-incentive to ramping up production. It's not fair. But neither is the UK and EU getting wildly more doses per capita than Africa, South America or Oceania.

kitd 6y ago
Tbf, I believe the "no profit" clause comes from Oxford university, the IP owner.
radiator 6y ago
Why on Earth is it not fair that the UK and EU get more doses of their own vaccines per capita than Africa, South America or Oceania? Why would they be obliged to export even one dose of something they produced, before they have provided for every single one of their citizens?
- JumpCrisscross 6y ago
  > Why on Earth is it not fair that the UK and EU get more doses of their own vaccines per capita than Africa, South America or Oceania? My point is fairness is in the eye of the beholder. What we're left with are contracts. And contractually, AstraZeneca seems to be in the right. The EU negotiated, at first glance (and to this non-expert), a poor agreement.
  - Isinlor 6y ago
    Under international trade agreements we (EU) can also stop exports of the vaccines as did UK in the contracts. Whatever the means, as long as they are legal, we can and should force equal burden of delays. I guess EU didn't play it the best way from political perspective, since we are now labeled as bad. Still, I'm personally impressed that EU is actually able to do something of consequence in somewhat short time frame.

oliwarner 6y ago

They spend half their time talking to their government, who say that. The BBC can't win. When they editorialise to try to dig into a subject, it's left wing pandering, and when they just listen to official sources, they're right wing mouthpieces.

simonswords82 6y ago
True that - which is why it's so important to obtain news from multiple sources and then attempt to form your own view.

bitcharmer 6y ago

I don't understand, where is BBC incorrect here? How would you like them to report on this? EU was months late and they move much slower than other parties in the whole process and on top of that they signed agreements with "best effort" clauses instead of hard obligation of vaccine delivery. How is this UK's fault?

DangerousPie 6y ago
Nobody is saying it's the UK's fault, but just because they signed the agreement a few months later doesn't mean that AZ isn't bound to that agreement. There is no "first come first serve" clause in there.
- adrianb 6y ago
  Interesting. How are these contracts supposed to work? In general when I buy something and have to wait, I expect to get it before everyone who buys after me. Not sure how these contracts work.
  - krona 6y ago
    Which is exactly why AZ split the UK/EU supply chain to try avoid such issues entirely (CEOs words.) The contract is vague and nonspecific about commiting UK factories to supply the EU. The whole thing is a parody of Brussels bureaucratism.
    - mrtksn 6y ago
      >The contract is vague and nonspecific about the UK factories supplying the EU. It's not, it's clearly stated that the contract covers the UK facilities. Check article 5.4
      - krona 6y ago
        My interpretation comes from 2 seperate lawyers. Why are they wrong?

alibarber 6y ago

But surely the EU hasn't exactly covered itself in glory here? They, factually, objectively, _were_ later in signing an agreement, and have taken longer to approve a vaccine in use elsewhere in the world. Why should they not share some blame from their citizens like any other politician should? The UK government deserves scorn for their handling of the pandemic in the UK. The EU should be criticised for this. It is not a football match. We do not need to 'support' one 'side' against the other.

GizmoSwan 6y ago
There is/was issues with submitted vaccine data. Technically it wouldn't have been approved in normal times till they could get better proven data. Now it is all water under the bridge because countries are desperate to have enough vaccines. 6 months from now, all countries are going to pretend to be nice nice and when there will be oversupply and new variant of the COVID, they will be dumping the old vaccines on other countries.
alibarber 6y ago
Instead of downvoting - please do tell me what is offensive, or how you feel this does not add to the discussion. Or at least do both.

GizmoSwan 6y ago

Every country is for itself when shit hits ceiling, that is my conclusion. Territorial dogma took over with PPP and respirators too. Now the Swiss and Brits are not part of EU and their own interest supersedes their alliance with EU obviously.

jack_riminton 6y ago
Nitpicking but the phrase is "shit hits the fan" i.e. it would go everywhere Shit hitting the ceiling wouldn't be that dramatic in comparison :)
- GizmoSwan 6y ago
  LOL yup...

salicideblock 6y ago

I am surprised why anyone is discussing who signed first, given that in the contract AstraZeneca warrants that: "it is not under any obligation, contractual or otherwise, to any Person or third party in respect of the Initial Europe Doses or that conflicts with or is inconsistent in any material respect with the terms of this Agreement or that would impede the complete fulfillment of its obligations under this Agreement;" This ended up not being true, which was not totally unexpected. AstraZeneca ends up in the bad position of choosing on which of their contracts their will fail, and they evidently chose to fail the EU's in its near totality for the next few months. It pains me to see the cynicism in shielding behind "best effort" clauses (standard in any procurement under R&D) or in "who came first". It's a serious matter that warrants a cooler and more balanced solution that this.

JumpCrisscross 6y ago
> in respect of the Initial Europe Doses There is text blacked out in the definition of Initial Europe Doses after "within the EU" that I'm curious about. Also, the clause reads "AstraZeneca has committed to use Best Reasonable Efforts...to build capacity to manufacture 300 million Doses of the Vaccine...for distribution within the EU..." That's ambiguous with respect to distribution. AstraZeneca are using Best Reasonable Efforts to build this manufacturing capacity. But they aren't under Best Reasonable Efforts obligations to use this capacity for the EU. (The definition of Best Reasonable Efforts overlooks distribution entirely.) It's a shitty situation. Pain has to be allocated. But based on contract, versus loose notions of fairness, AstraZeneca is under no obligation to export British-made doses to the EU.
- hef19898 6y ago
  AZis only obliged to deliver to hubs in each member state. That's it, nothing else. Hubs have to take the delivery within 5 days of being notofied of that delivery. That's about it regarding actual deliveries. Pretty thin, especially compared to the 4 pages covering the order form.
- throwawaymanbot 6y ago
  well ok. Let them return all the money the EU gave them. And let them understand how AZ might have market access problems to the EU from now on.

gutnor 6y ago

That was the same in the Touring Visa that for a while was "The EU refused" and it became just the opposite a few weeks later. But that's the story of Brexit and its 40 years of media support. Even the BBC has often been on the technically correct side happily reporting welcome change as "UK change" and blaming unwelcome on the EU, even if the UK voted for it.

calpaterson 6y ago

Those are the simple facts and they are pretty operative: - The UK signed months before - The EU has been slow to vaccinate independent of that AZ dispute - The EMA did only approve this vaccine (which the UK is already using) a few hours ago This dispute has sadly been made into a hugely sensitive national dispute as a distraction from the poor performance of the EU's vaccination programme. Even if nothing had gone wrong with the AZ vaccine production, the EU still would have much poorer rollout than the UK. It's just a cover of jingoism.

agd 6y ago
Not sure why you've been downvoted. It seems very clear that the commission is whipping up a political storm here to deflect from the fact it's done a bad job with vaccine procurement, which will cost thousands of European lives.
- calpaterson 6y ago
  It takes a certain bravery to post any opinion that is critical of the EU on HN. Always a danger to your karma :)
- hef19898 6y ago
  I don't see procurement as the main issue. The EU ordered around 2.3 billion doses, for 450 million inhabitants. Quantity wise, that's more than enough. They did screw up distrbution so, royaly. And with distribution being the responsbility of the member states, well go figure. This contract has its defiencies, I really hate it that there are n consequences when delivery schedules aren't met. And how delivery schedules will be defined.
  - agd 6y ago
    It wasn't the total quantity that was the problem. It was the timing. It's no use having hundreds of millions of doses if they aren't available until Q4.
    - 6y ago

YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago

It's the same if you read the Guardian. It's clear that the apparent europhilia of some liberal media was nothing but a political play. They pretended to support Europe only because their rivals, the Tory-supporting media, were against it. Or pretended to be. None of those people believe anything at all.

btbuilder 6y ago
or perhaps they are jointly shocked to see the EU behave in this way and are providing opinion on this one issue rather than sticking to a predetermined side?
- YeGoblynQueenne 6y ago
  "Genuinely" shocked, you mean? I'm speaking of a more general trend I've observed, not connected to the AstraZeneca fiasco. It's difficult to give examples, but to my mind and given my prior experience with Guardian articles, it seems to me that there's a clear de-escalation of partisanship in EU-related news.

kcartlidge 6y ago

I'm British. I do however believe we should vaccinate the most at risk groups, then be more generous with the UK production facilities for the EU's more at risk groups whilst slowing down our efforts for our own less at risk ones (which includes me). It's the humane thing to do. That said, my sympathy for the EU (as an opponent of Brexit) has been diminished by their attempted bullying behaviour. They initially wanted the UK in on their EU procurement. Unlike the EU members of the grouping we were to be excluded from any say in the vaccines chosen, the quantities, the pricing, the manufacturing, and the distribution. No say on anything; take what you're given. They left us with no choice but to do our own deals. We did those deals faster and with less guarantees at that early stage, fronted virtually the whole cost of the AstraZeneca UK production, accepted liability rather than insisting (as per the EU) that the vaccine makers did, and paid much more, just to get a faster agreement (and we still had the same teething issues the EU are facing now; we weren't special in that regard). Despite all that risk, up front cost, higher prices, and accepted liability, the EU is now demanding that the instant they approve the vaccine they can dip into the supply that has cost the UK far more than most people realise we gave up in order to get that swift delivery. The EU stumbled by not realising the urgency last year, then stumbled again by badly insulting the UK with the EU procurement "offer" terms which forced us to negotiate separately. I have a great amount of sympathy for the EU people (I may not be in the EU any more, but I'm still European) but none of this is the doing of the UK - who are simply carrying on using the vaccines delivered - and the first 'shot' at actual vaccine nationalism has been fired not by the mad brexiteers but by the EU with their Northern Ireland border statements and not-export-control-really new 'monitoring' and 'agreement' position. I really expected coming into this year to find myself part of a massive UK villain state facing a more reasonable EU. I didn't foresee a desparate EU attacking a UK just going about it's own business.

senko 6y ago
As a EU citizen, I agree with your assessment completely. The EU bungled this and it would not be fair if we were to bully our way out of it. It's sad to see this being a zero sum game, and no way you cut it people are going to suffer (already are) somewhere. I was expecting a bit more decency on our side. Shattered superiority complex after Brits mismanaged Brexit, maybe? Our lack of coordination and flailing in this regard is equally impressive.

oli5679 6y ago

The capacity to manufacture it in UK was developed by a UK government grant that was issued in May and a UK government order that was issued soon after. It is being produced at cost by AstraZeneca. The UK acted quickly, realising that each week of lockdown costs a similar amount to their entire vaccine expenditure. They got scientific advice and backed a range of different technologies. Meanwhile the EU acted bureaucratically and treated this like a procurement exercise, squabbling about spending and placing orders in December. It is now scapegoating andsuing a company that is producing the vaccine at cost. GSK has every inventive to scale up capacity and produce as many doses as possible, and has no profit motive to divert doses. It is simply abiding by its agreement with the UK to use UK funded capacity to supply the country first, whilst making best efforts to iron out kinks for European orders. https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-coronavirus-vaccine-struggle-pfizer-biontech-astrazeneca/ https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-coronavirus-vaccine-s...

breakfastduck 6y ago

I've never seen such an anti EU reaction both domestically (UK) and internationally. You try and imply the BBC has been pro brexit - but seriously, this is by far the most hostile the liberal UK media has been to the EU in a long time.

timellis-smith 6y ago
You don't think that threatening a trade war, threatening to break the NI agreement which was a red-line for the EU, blaming the British for your failures and closing off vaccine exports to the UK warrants a degree of hostility? Edit: Also spreading fake news about the efficacy of the drug. I suspect if the EU were to invade the UK, you would still be attacking the UK press for outrage.
- breakfastduck 6y ago
  Erm, are you replying to the right person? I frankly dislike the EU and am thoroughly enjoying them make such an ass of themselves.