News: 1611940141

"reminiscent of the early days of IT two decades ago,"

I really hope that was intended to be sarcasm.

the EU is claiming that the contract is broken but does not show everything ? So why hide part of it ?

I could understand if it was things like price paid, but it is more than that.

The EU appears to have broken the confidentiality clause in the contract, I would encourage Astra-Zeneca to claim a contract violation and not honour any of it.

There's plenty of countries who'll buy all the vaccine they can make.

> The EU appears to have broken the confidentiality clause in the contract, I would encourage Astra-Zeneca to claim a contract violation and not honour any of it

It's not mentioned in the article, but AZ agreed to the publication of the (redacted) contract. The botched redaction wouldn't be counted as a deliberate breach of the confidentiality clause.

A breach is a breach... deliberate or not doesn't matter. Duty of care, etc.

True, but a breach doesn't necessarily nullify the whole of the contract.

As an aside, I'd be much more interested in seeing unredacted versions of the vaccine test results...

The title says it all really.

3...2...1... and here come the Remoaners

PS - Will the ICO be able to fine the EU for this data breach?

> PS - Will the ICO be able to fine the EU for this data breach?

No. It's a contractual matter not anything the ICO is responsible for enforcing.

And not PII.

If data blunders by government are reason to leave a union then the UK is certainly finished.

You might want to re-check your timelines:

https://www.politico.eu/article/uk-coronavirus-vaccine-astrazeneca-export-boris-johnson/

To me, the EU appears to be the reacting party in this situation.

The fact that BOJO decided to turn the UK into a giant petri-dish for the breeding of new strains did not do much to defuse the situation either.

Your link doesn't really support your argument. It simply states that the government banned several drugs that were/are intended to be used by the NHS from being exported for a profit. There's nothing stopping companies specifically making drugs for export and exporting those. The article also points out that the EU has banned exports of medical products well. It relates how France refused to allow PPE to be exported to its EU neighbours. And it also notes that the ramping up of export bans were at least part in preparation for the possibility of a no-deal BREXIT. No the real point here, is that the EU was slow to get it's act together and was months behind the UK in securing vaccine supplies. A little trade spat with the UK and AstraZeneca is a good way of diverting attention from their own cock-up.

But that said, now would be a good time IMO, in the interests of future EU relations, for the UK government to offer to help the EU with supplies, particularly as BOJO seems have secured a massive supply of vaccines for the UK.

That would be the case Serendipity, but if BOJO offers to help the EU now some people will say he is being weak giving in to EU pressure. A no win situation for him.

Like or loath Brexit, The UK can now trade with the world without the dead hand of the EU on the tiller. In my view the correct use of any surplice UK vaccines is donation to the third world free of any conditions save that it is not to be sold to citizens or other countries. That is the way to curtail Covid.

Can't wait to hear how BoJo is also responsible for the South African, the Spanish, the Denmark, the Brazilian, the Nigerian, the Kenyan, and the Malaysian strains.

The Boris Bug is a world beater though!

The fact that BOJO decided to turn the UK into a giant petri-dish for the breeding of new strains did not do much to defuse the situation either.

I'm not completely convinced that the "Kent Strain" didn't float across the channel in the first place. The UK has offered to sequence the virus in other countries, either to help identify yet more strains, or shift the perceived blame elsewhere.

Regardless of differing points of view, I think all parties involved* are displaying very poor behaviour. People are dying FFS.

*Apart from AstraZenica and other vaccine manufacturers. They need to be treated like heroes. Beer for the boffins. Thank you.

"3...2...1... and here come the Remoaners"

For God's sake grow up. Leave won and now you are harping on about something that has been settled. Wrongly in my opinion as news is daily proving.

I've heard of bad losers, but bad winners?

I think it will take about 4 more years until we are even on the bad looser/bad winner front.

Can't help wondering how much this is due to the Sanofi (Pasteur) vaccine falling over. Brits got a vaccine out, Germans got a vaccine out, but the French are behind, that must rankle. And these production problems are supposedly at a Belgian plant, embarrassing for a country whose death rates look worse than the UK's.

I'm just waiting for Farage to point out that the vaccine is an animal product (from human cells no less!) so the EU will be obliged to make it wait 3 weeks on the dock while the paperwork is checked...

Not really sure you can compare death rates as the UK and Belgium don't measure them in the same way.

The "Brits" got a vaccine out using supplies from Belgium in conjunction with a Swedish pharma firm and using, to some extent, EU funds. The "German" one is in conjunction with an American firm and is produced in Belgium... and so on... Attributing it to one nation seems a bit facile...

The reality is that different countries/trading blocks took different bets on which vaccine would work out best (for some definition of best), that betting also included timing as well as choosing the horse. It looks like Israel did well out of it and the UK has so far done fairly well... the EU not quite so well but at least some of that is down to luck really. If the AstraZeneca vaccine hadn't worked out quite so well then the UK would probably be trailing behind other countries and everyone would be moaning about BoJo having screwed up again!

If the AstraZeneca vaccine hadn't worked out quite so well then the UK would probably be trailing behind other countries

That would be the same UK that rolled out the pfizer vaccine before any other country? The one that's ahead of every country in the EU? The one that's got pre-orders in for the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines?

Ok.

And the childish argument goes on..... The UK did start using the Pfize/Biotech vaccine before other EU countries, some say because the other EU countries were more conservative in their reviewing process, some for other reasons but I didn't see any sign that the UK would be so advanced if it weren't for the AstraZeneca vaccine.

The EU approved the Moderna vaccine before the UK... but again I don't think it made much difference.

The bottom line is that we're confronted by a nasty virus and the sooner we're ALL vaccinated, regardless of nationality, the better for all of us.

That would be the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine developed and trialled by Oxford University with UK government support with AZ being brought in only later to produce it at scale - and not-for-profit at Oxford's insistence. UK vaccine funding per head is seven times higher than the EU's (and where do you think the EU gets its money from anyway, if not member states?).

The reality is AZ chose to produce with partners located in the territory the vaccine was intended for specifically to avoid territorial spats like this and that vaccines produced in a certain territory are exclusive to that territory until a certain production number has been reached and only beyond which they can be exported. The EU Commission have twisted that last part with their agreement with AZ that UK soil could be treated as EU for the purposes of new EU production (sensible: it was invented here) and conflated it into a claim on existing UK production which is simply not in the contract.

Vaccine production is a biochemical process whose yield takes time to establish. The embarrassing truth is that the UK were around one month ahead of some EU member states in establishing AZ vaccine production, perhaps because it was developed here, up until the Commission got involved and insisted it negotiate on behalf of all of the bloc which added an additional two months, hence the three months late accusation. This is an existential embarrassment to the Commission as it suggest that when they get involved it adds little except delay and that member states are often better off acting independently as the UK has done and could only do because of? Brexit…

The Commission's response is pure face-saving and we've all had enough of that after Wuhan, Hubei and the CCP and additionally it's a distraction for AZ's CEO who has a more important task of running a corporation producing an effective, not-for-profit vaccine suitable for both developed and developing countries.

Here's some quotes from him in a Repubblica interview:

"In the EU agreement it is mentioned that the manufacturing sites in the UK were an option for Europe, but only later"

"As soon as we have reached a sufficient number of vaccinations in the UK, we will be able to use that site to help Europe as well. But the contract with the UK was signed first and the UK, of course, said 'you supply us first'"

Source: [1]Pascal Soriot La Repubblica interview

[1] https://www.repubblica.it/cronaca/2021/01/26/news/interview_pascal_soriot_ceo_astrazeneca_coronavirus_covid_vaccines-284349628/

"It looks like Israel did well out of it"

Potentially early to say that. We don't yet know details of what personal data was surrendered to get it so fast. A PM on trial over various corruption charges, unstable government likely to and now going to face elections, alongside a pandemic, might have caused a wee bit of panic and self-interest at the Pfizer negotiating table.

There may be politicians who feel that way, but the smart response is to recognise that everyone tried different approaches and (based on what we knew 12 months ago) it is completely random who got lucky and produced a working vaccine.

I am grateful that the French tried whatever it was they did. That could easily have been the only one that worked.

It's done!

The contract clearly states that AstraZenica has to try to manufacture the 300m doses of vaccine for the EU, in the EU.

Section 5.1 says "AstraZenica shall use it's Best Reasonable Efforts to manufacture the Initial Europe Doses within the EU for distribution, and to deliver to the Distribution Hubs....".

Let me repeat that, it has to try it's best to "manufacture the Initial Europe Doses within the EU". And "the EU" specifically does not include the UK (see Section 5.4, which says "the EU [...] for the purpose of this Section 5.4 only shall include the United Kingdom" - which makes it clear that in *other* sections the EU does NOT include the United Kingdom). The "Initial Europe Doses" means the first 300 million doses, which are what they're currently trying to get. Note this doesn't apply to the 100 million doses that the EU can choose to buy after that - but it can't take delivery of the 100 million extra doses until after the first 300 million doses have been delivered.

Now, it does also have to "use it's Best Reasonable Efforts to manufacture the Vaccine at manufacturing sites located within the EU (which, for the purpose of this Section 5.4 only shall include the United Kingdom)". However, nothing says it has to give doses manufactured in the UK to the EU. And 5.1 is fairly explicit about how the initial batch of 300 million doses should be manufactured in the EU. Presumably this section is talking about the following 100 million+ doses.

Ah, I see you've read it.

I'm highly amused that the BBC refuses to mention or show section 5.1.

Although they're also keeping quiet on whether Pfizer vaccine imports from Belgium will be halted now that the EU has required export licences on all vaccines, and put a hard border in place in Ireland in breach of the Good Friday Agreement.

I seem to recall a certain Mr Biden being rather keen that nobody did that.

"manufacture the Initial Europe Doses within the EU"

But the contract does also say the the UK is part of the EU for the purposes of the contract.

I think we should sue them for libel (in London) :)

What nobody seems to be mentioning is that originally we were told that Astra-Zeneca would have 30 M doses ready by the end of September. What happened to those? I'm sure that would give a big clue to the EU a long while ago that the timing of contracts was not going to be kept. I don't remember any 'time is of the essence' clauses in the contract anyway?

"Reasonable endeavours" - that wonderful get out clause.

SO the EU has "Reasonable endeavours". Meanwhile, the UK contract (which we haven't seen) probably says they will buy the first 100M doses off the production line (or something similar).

It looks like enough contradiction between 5.1 & 5.4 to keep several lawyers' children fed.

I can't quite see the point of closing the Irish border for exports from the Republic to NI given that the latter is likely to have the better supply and it sets a precedent for the UK to reciprocate in banning exports. The smart thing for BoJo to do would be to allow some exports as a matter of goodwill - and respond to the border ban by dismantling as much of the Irish sea border as possible as that is really the biggest danger to the UK as a whole in the entire Brexit shambles.

On the whole it seems like classic managerial approach. Let's play the blame game instead of "What can we do to help get production going?". Ans no country or bloc has a monopoly on experts at that.

On the whole it seems like classic managerial approach. Let's play the blame game instead of "What can we do to help get production going?"

That seems to be what Germany's Bild newspaper is saying.