Presumably this is a part of the “solidarity” landscape… preventing breakaway member countries buying the Russian one for example. Each country should be able to approve vaccines for its citizens.
In general, does Brussels have to approve all drugs for use in the EU, or are member countries able to approve drugs themselves?
Despite what the UK media would have you believe, individual countries have been able to approve vaccines from the start. Most however, chose the EMA route. Hungary, has for instance, approved the China vaccine and might also approve the Russian one.
France, following the Brussels, EMA combined EU route may well have been a big mistake, given the small number of vaccines given here.
We won’t really know how far behind other countries we will end up being until May or June. That’s when we will see how big a mistake we made.
We do however have free PCR tests with same day results and, unless it is just where I live, we have good local testing centres.
Towards the end of the year we might also see how much effect the slow vaccine roll out will have on the President’s chances of re-election.
I wouldn’t view any vaccinations I choose to have (or not have) as any business of an aviation regulator.
It seems the French have come up a new strategy to make supply go further – one dose only for people who’ve had Covid-19. Might be a good move.
But didn’t EMA hold off with approvals because of lobbying by Macron who desperately wanted the Sanofi vaccine in the mix? Pity that Sanofi never succeeded in making one.
But didn’t EMA hold off with approvals because of lobbying by Macron who desperately wanted the Sanofi vaccine in the mix?
Honestly I think that is being too kind to the EMA. I think the truth is more that the EMA has shown itself to be too bureaucratic and inflexible in an emergency. Some might call it reckless or incompetent.
I really don’t think saying that they held off for the French when everyone else including the Commission were screaming out for vaccines, is credible.
Peter wrote:
Each country should be able to approve vaccines for its citizens.
I think each country are. What happened was that much less fuzz was envisioned by countries going together, and it would also be less risky. Even if a vaccine is approved by EMA, it still has to be approved in Norway (although that is purely a “stamp” on some papers). It seems to me that Norwegian officials were completely clueless about the whole vaccine thing in the beginning. We got bags of money. We are only 5.5 million people, and if there was some commerce DNA in these officials we would all be vaccinated, at least by end of February, and would have had lots to spare.
What happened was that by late summer 2020, they still had no clue other than involvement in Curevac and Novavax I think. That involvement however was not meant to get vaccines to us in particular, and had nothing to do with those officials. It was by then (way) too late to have any chance of purchasing any of the, by then already existing vaccines (Pfizer etc) in a timely fashion. Then Ursula von der Leyen, personally from what I heard, literally came in and saved us. All EFTA countries (Norway, Island, Switzerland and Lichtenstein) would of course be included in the EU alliance vaccine program she said. We are all in this together was her words. For Norway this meant to “piggyback” on Sweden, but we pay more for the vaccine than EU countries.
All in all I think the end result was OK, given the dead end situation the officials had messed us into. Ursula von der Leyen deserves respect IMO, and EU as well.
Sanofi would have been the manufacturer, it was the Institute Pasteur where the research was being done. Just as Oxford University and BioNtech created the other vaccines.
Institut Pasteur were looking at 3 different routes to a vaccine. All of the routes were different to the normal way of producing a vaccine. One for instance would have been a patch rather like a nicotine patch. Sadly none of the routes bore fruit. But then AIUI not all research brings the intended results.
I have not heard within France of any lobbying to delay approval of vaccines by Macron. In fact as far as I know France also contributed to the financing of the research into the AZ, the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines and others,as well as to the Pasteur/Sanofi research.
I have also not heard that people who have had Covid will only get one dose. Having said that my area is fully booked for vaccines and whereas I was expecting to get mine this month it looks like this has now slipped to March.
This might be because of vaccine shortages, although I will not be offered the AZ vaccine due to my age, but it might also be down to poor vaccine roll out by the Government.
The Sanofi thing was about the EU procurement programme, not EMA approvals. France lobbied hard to ensure Sanofi got a big chunk of the procurement programme, even when it was clear they were way behind other companies.
The EMA, while a bit slower and more bureaucratic than either the MHRA or FDA, is largely free from political interference.
With hindsight Norway should just have ordered 12m doses from every single manufacturer right at the start. Small population and money no object. They could have had 2 jabs into everyone a couple of weeks ago. Why did they sit around and wait for the EU to sort them out? There must be a reason.
Under the transition arrangements, the UK was still bound by EU law while it set up its vaccine program, so it clearly was OK!
Graham wrote:
With hindsight Norway should just have ordered 12m doses from every single manufacturer right at the start. Small population and money no object. They could have had 2 jabs into everyone a couple of weeks ago. Why did they sit around and wait for the EU to sort them out? There must be a reason.
I’m sure there will be a lot written and said about this in the near future. The only thing that would have improved the situation would have been to bet on Pfizer, like Israel did. Let’s not forget that Israel got lucky with their bet on Pfizer. Norway initially, and still is, heavy involved in Curevac and Novavax (I think, but there could be some others). Exactly what happened, I don’t know, but cluelessnes is as good as an explanation as any other at this time, because it was early discovered that none of those vaccines would be production ready to the extent needed. From the people actually working with those vaccines, they say it was never the intention to be first, because other had a head start in any case (China and Russia in particular. That Pfizer should come along as they did was not a given). Eventually all the trains had already gone, and Norway sat there with no vaccines that had a chance to be ready by early 2021 
Then on August 14
Thus put us in the same boat as Germany, Sweden, Denmark etc. All in all, not a bad situation. The only downturn has been AZ to be honest.
