[levosmetalo]

AZ ban game in EU has more to do with the internal politics than with the medical argumentation.

For many of the corrupt governments it's easier to say "we don't vaccinate because AZ is not safe" that the cold truth "we don't vaccinate because we were not able to order enough vaccines on time."

The reason why we don't have enough vaccines in the EU is:

- Can't get Moderna, Pfizer/Biontech because "America first"

- Can't get enough AZ because UK was faster with ordering

- Can't get Sputnik, Sinovac because US doesn't want that their vassals buy from their enemies

[psychiatrist24]

I think it is complete bullshit to blame everything on the US. The EU government screwed up. Biontech was even developed in Europe, how exactly can the US prevent its use here?

[that_guy_iain]

> - Can't get enough AZ because UK was faster with ordering

The EU contract was signed the day before the UK one, no?

[detritus]

From a very brief Google, it looks like there was a near three month difference:

UK, May 2020: https://www.cambridgeindependent.co.uk/business/astrazeneca-...

EU, August 2020: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_20_...

(Thanks for making me check - I've read that there was a few-month delay from some newspapers, but never bothered to verify)

[that_guy_iain]

I believe you'll be looking at when they announced their intent but not when they signed the contract. - https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/17/europe/uk-astrazeneca-vac...

[detritus]

You may well be correct, technically (I'll admit, I've not got a clue) but it seems that late May was essentially when an agreement in all but the finalised signing was made, with the UK government investing £65M in the Oxford/AZ vaccine effort.

https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2020-05-18-funding-and-manufacturi...

[that_guy_iain]

I'm pretty sure the EU invested more in the AZ vaccine in total over the course of things. Honestly, this just seems to be petty "We want the vaccines so we can vaccine non risk groups" while the EU needs to vaccinate their risk group. The Tories have used the vaccine program to divert from the hide their corruption and incomptence.

[detritus]

A cursory Google search implies that the EU did indeed invest quite a lot of money on the AZ vaccine roll out, mid-August, after it had already entered trials which had been part-funded by the UK government months earlier.

The EU investment appears to amount to a deposit on actual vaccine doses, and a sum to ensure that dose costs are kept at cost until the pandemic is over - rather than a support of the development itself, which appears to have mostly born by AZ itself, the UK government and Oxford university. The UK has since spent billions (about £3Bn?) on AZ Vaccine procurement, a figure which dwarfs the EU's spend on the same (I think it's something like EUR360M?).

As much as I dislike politics and am disgusted by some of the costs - especially around PPEs last year (which seems to have been much abused) - I find it easier to believe that there was a lot of panicked flailing and a gamble on vaccines as a way out of this mess that would allow the UK to get started back up ASAP, which they're now reaping, rather than using the current mess as a distractionary political football.

[nickpp]

Maybe, but it didn't contain a priority clause, which the UK one did.

[that_guy_iain]

Not according to https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/17/europe/uk-astrazeneca-vac...

[tomjen3]

They are looking into Sputnik, but because it is Russia we need to test it for our selves.

The same would be the case with Sinovac, with the added proviso that I would want to know if it had been developed using human tests on their concentration camp inmates.