BRUSSELS (AP) – The European Union’s dispute with AstraZeneca intensified on Wednesday with the Anglo-Swedish pharmacist denying the EU’s claim that it had withdrawn from talks on the supply of vaccines.
AstraZeneca said in a statement that it still planned to meet with EU officials in Brussels later. The comments came after EU officials said the company had informed the blog that it would not attend a meeting to discuss delayed vaccine commitments, the third such conversation in so many days.
“The representative of AstraZeneca had announced this morning, he had informed us this morning that his participation is not confirmed, it is not happening,” said Dana Spinant, spokeswoman for the European Commission.
The dispute between AstraZeneca and the EU has raised concerns about vaccine nationalism, as countries desperate to end the pandemic and return the jockey to normalcy for a limited supply of precious vaccines.
The latest disagreement between the two sides came after AstraZeneca rejected the EU’s accusation that the company had failed to meet its commitments to deliver coronavirus vaccines. AstraZeneca said the figures for its contract with the EU were targets that could not be achieved due to problems in the rapid expansion of production capacity.
The chief executive, Pascal Soriot, made the comments in an interview with the Italian newspaper La Repubblica after days of criticism from EU leaders furious at the news that AstraZeneca’s initial shipments would be lower than anticipated .
The Anglo-Swedish drug maker said last week that it planned to reduce initial deliveries to the EU to 31 million doses by 80 million due to reduced performance in the manufacturing process.
“Our contract is not a contractual commitment,” Soriot said. “It’s the best effort. Basically, we said we will do our best, but we cannot guarantee that we will succeed. In fact, when we get there, we’re a little behind. “
AstraZeneca said in a statement that it understands and shares “the frustration that the initial supply volumes of our vaccine delivered to the European Union will be lower than expected.”
On Monday, the EU threatened to impose strict export controls in a matter of days for COVID-19 vaccines manufactured on the block.
The EU, which has 450 million citizens and the economic and political impact of the world’s largest trading bloc, lags far behind countries such as Israel and Britain in launching coronavirus vaccines for their health workers and the most vulnerable people. This despite having more than 400,000 confirmed deaths from viruses since the pandemic began.
The expected delivery deficit of the AstraZeneca vaccine is achieved at the same time as there is a slowdown in the distribution of Pfizer-BioNTech shots, as this company is improving the production facilities of a plant in Belgium.
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Kirka reported from London.
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