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The big Brexit thread - news, updates and discussion

andysays said:
Interestingly, that article says


This current dispute has absolutely nothing to do with rich nations sharing vaccine or vaccine making capacity with poorer nations, which would be a great example of putting internationalism above "vaccine nationalism" in a way which might well be of some benefit to the rich donor nations as well as the poorer recipient nations.

I think it would be great if both Britain and the EU made some active commitment to export vaccines beyond Europe to countries and regions struggling to produce their own, perhaps even including those where they have effectively outsourced dealing with people wanting to migrate to Britain and/or the EU, but I don't expect that to happen any time soon.
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300million doses for COVAX, a billion doses coming out of(and staying in) India...Its not "Vaccine nationism", the EU isn't a nation, if it was they'd have an ambassador
 
Pingety Pong said:
Sorry but I find it really offensive to make out that this is an attempt to "retaliate against the British public" which sounds like straight out of the Daily Mail or even worse. Like Raheem said, they are trying to secure ways to supply vaccines to people in Europe which is perfectly understandable surely? Maybe try to see it from the other side for one minute - I live in England, I am volunteering at the local vaccination centre, I am ridiculously happy for every single person here who gets his or her jab. But my mother who is in her mid-80s and extremely vulnerable lives in Germany and her appointment for her first Pfizer jab is at the end of March. She mostly blames the over-cautious German health administration who took too long to authorise the vaccine. But she is also a bit angry (and I think understandably so) that my British MiL who is 70 and in good health has already had her first jab while she will have to wait for another two months. For a vaccine that was developed in Germany by German scientist. And that has absolutely nothing to do whatsoever to do with retaliation, but is much more about fairness.
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The EU has beef with AstraZeneca, and has made threats to stop Pfizer exporting vaccines to the UK as a direct result of that. I don't want to see anyone who needs a vaccine go without, but that is exactly what these threats amount to. It wouldn't even be a question of redirecting vaccines from one place to another, as the EMA has not approved the Pfizer vaccine. There doesn't even seem to be a token pretence that exports of the Pfizer vaccine to the UK have any bearing on the issue with the supply of AstraZeneca vaccines to the EU, and yet the threat was made just the same.
 
Also if people have had the first Pfizer jab and then can't get a second thanks to some tit-for-tat bullshit, they may finish up with no lasting protection. In that case blocking exports would be worse than just denying people medical care, it would effectively undo medical care that had already been provided. That is not an acceptable 'option' to put on the table. For any reason.
 
SpookyFrank said:
Also if people have had the first Pfizer jab and then can't get a second thanks to some tit-for-tat bullshit, they may finish up with no lasting protection. In that case blocking exports would be worse than just denying people medical care, it would effectively undo medical care that had already been provided. That is not an acceptable 'option' to put on the table. For any reason.
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With me going in for my first Pfizer jab I'd agree with this :)
 
No it'll be fine, just .. be more positive! You know, one smore unto the fridge and all that!
Each time there's a chance to do the right thing .. the wrong thing happens. Everybody blames somebody else.
People die .. so many people die. Go off-licence with vaccine dosing to make it look as if we really are doing something.
Send lackeys onto the radio and TV to start the campaign of blaming the public for not having enough common sense.
It's all disgusting.
 
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SpookyFrank said:
The EU has beef with AstraZeneca, and has made threats to stop Pfizer exporting vaccines to the UK as a direct result of that. I don't want to see anyone who needs a vaccine go without, but that is exactly what these threats amount to. It wouldn't even be a question of redirecting vaccines from one place to another, as the EMA has not approved the Pfizer vaccine. There doesn't even seem to be a token pretence that exports of the Pfizer vaccine to the UK have any bearing on the issue with the supply of AstraZeneca vaccines to the EU, and yet the threat was made just the same.
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Yes, the EMA has approved the Pfizer vaccine. It is the AZ that they haven't approved. And the tit-for-tat bullshit seems to have been started by the Tories who are not letting any Astra Zenica vaccines made in Britain to be exported to the EU, but are still expecting their made-in-Belgium Pfizer vaccines to be delivered to the UK. If you really can't see how unfair this is, I give up.
 
Pingety Pong said:
Yes, the EMA has approved the Pfizer vaccine. It is the AZ that they haven't approved. And the tit-for-tat bullshit seems to have been started by the Tories who are not letting any Astra Zenica vaccines made in Britain to be exported to the EU, but are still expecting their made-in-Belgium Pfizer vaccines to be delivered to the UK. If you really can't see how unfair this is, I give up.
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It's certainly helped the news cycle shift from "COVID deaths pass 100,000 after massive Tory failures cause world-leading death rate" to "EU tyrants jealous of Britain's world-leading vaccination progress demand Britain surrender its vaccines."
 
Pingety Pong said:
Yes, the EMA has approved the Pfizer vaccine. It is the AZ that they haven't approved. And the tit-for-tat bullshit seems to have been started by the Tories who are not letting any Astra Zenica vaccines made in Britain to be exported to the EU, but are still expecting their made-in-Belgium Pfizer vaccines to be delivered to the UK. If you really can't see how unfair this is, I give up.
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AstraZeneca decide where they send their vaccines. The UK hasn't blocked any exports.
 
SpookyFrank said:
AstraZeneca decide where they send their vaccines. The UK hasn't blocked any exports.
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And obviously they don't just "decide where they send their vaccine", they are bound by contracts. And that's the beef that other countries in Europe have - they are not standing by the contracts that have been signed?
 
Pingety Pong said:
And obviously they don't just "decide where they send their vaccine", they are bound by contracts. And that's the beef that other countries in Europe have - they are not standing by the contracts that have been signed?
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That's still not the UK government blocking exports though, is it? As far as I'm currently aware the only threat to block vaccine exports has come from the EU suggesting they could prevent exports to the UK.
 
Pingety Pong said:
And obviously they don't just "decide where they send their vaccine", they are bound by contracts. And that's the beef that other countries in Europe have - they are not standing by the contracts that have been signed?
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Unless you've got the contracts in front of you, that's guesswork.
 
Spymaster said:
As far as I'm currently aware the only threat to block vaccine exports has come from the EU suggesting they could prevent exports to the UK.
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And have gone as far as cobbling together a legal mechanism to do so, albeit a tenuous one which seems to depend on a national regulator finding a product unfit for export.
 
Pingety Pong said:
And obviously they don't just "decide where they send their vaccine", they are bound by contracts. And that's the beef that other countries in Europe have - they are not standing by the contracts that have been signed?
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Think what has happened is that AZ have had production issues which mean they are not producing the quantity of vaccine they projected/promised. So they are unable to fulfil both their UK and EU contracts. They are choosing (and it almost certainly is a commercial choice) to fulfil the UK contract at the EU's expense because (a) that way they are only in breach of one contract, not two and (b) the unit price the UK is paying will be substantially higher than the EU would pay. We don't know by how much, but it could easily be as high as a nine-figure difference in total.
 
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Raheem said:
Think what has happened is that AZ have had production issues which mean they are not producing the quantity of vaccine they projected/promised. So they are unable to fulfil their UK and EU contracts. They are choosing (and it almost certainly is a commercial choice) to fulfil the UK contract because that way (a) they are only in breach of one contract, not two and (b) the unit price the UK is paying will be substantially higher than the EU would pay. We don't know my how much, but it could easily be as high as a nine-figure difference in total.
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There also seems to be some opacity around the wording of the EU contract. The CEO of AZ is saying that they are contracted to their "best efforts" to provide the specified number of vaccines within a specified period. Clearly that's subjective but the argument is between the EU and AstraZeneca, not the EU and the UK government (or at least it has been up to now).
 
I'm sure exporting our rubbish is still as easy as ever. And of course, the people running the show who 'export' a lot of their money to avoid its having to pay for hospital beds or a fishing industry.
 
Surely the best solution, post Brexit, is for every economic entity to have its own vaccine production facilities. Then every version of the vaccine can be tailored to the average genetic make-up of its citizens. Furthermore GPS systems can be utilised so that those who leave their own political and economic jurisdictions will be faced with sudden failure of the vaccine. This will be achieved through the intelligent usage of nanorobots, of course, and keep everyone in their proper place. For a few pence more we could arrange for certain geographic extensions, to the Costa del Sol, for example. To future-proof this system we will have to make provisional arrangements for the secession of Scotland and Ireland as well. Makes sense to me.
 
The headlines have been mental and thousands of lives are being directly threatened. But hey. At least most of the fans of an engorged sorry enlarged EU have had the good grace to cease with the abuse.
 
Frau Bahn clicked on the fail this morning and was worried WW3 was about to start, told her to try BBC, not a single mention of this on their front page...
 
Well at least it will make getting vaccinated more appealing, bogroll-style...
Sadly, to frothing Fail fellaters...
 
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TopCat said:
The headlines have been mental and thousands of lives are being directly threatened. But hey. At least most of the fans of an engorged sorry enlarged EU have had the good grace to cease with the abuse.
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im really not sure i understand what is going on - correct me if im wrong - my understanding is lives will be saved because the limited supplies of the Pfizer vaccine will end up being given to the most vulnerable sooner, no?
*im really not following this closely
 
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