German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday defended the European Union’s troubled vaccine drive, saying there were “good reasons” the rollout had got off to a slower start than in some other countries.
Speaking after a vaccine “summit” that brought together key players, Merkel renewed a promise to offer every German citizen a vaccine by the end of September.
Merkel had convened the online talks in response to growing anger in the 27-member bloc over the sluggish rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which has been beset with delivery delays and piled political pressure on EU leaders.
“It is true that in some areas, the pace became slower, but there were good reasons for it to be slower,” Merkel told reporters in Berlin.
Merkel, the leader of Europe’s largest economy, acknowledged that the United States, Israel and Britain were further along with their inoculations.
But she said the EU had deliberately avoided rushed emergency approvals, as seen in the UK, to bolster public “confidence” in the vaccines.
The EU had also at times negotiated “for a very long time” to ensure pharma companies took on enough liability, she said.
And the bloc chose not to sacrifice data protection, Merkel added, in a nod to Israel’s deal with Pfizer/BioNTech to offer data on its inoculation campaign in exchange for doses.
German media has been scathing about the EU’s troubled vaccine drive, with the top selling Bild daily calling it a “disaster”.
There was some good news from pharmaceutical companies in the run-up to Merkel’s conference, with new pledges for quicker deliveries.
BioNTech and Pfizer, whose vaccine was the first to be approved in the West, promised to send up to 75 million extra doses to the bloc in the spring thanks to progress at key manufacturing sites.
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On Sunday, European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said that AstraZeneca would finally deliver 40 million doses in total in the first quarter — nine million doses or 30% more than it had previously said it could.
According to a German health ministry document shared at the summit, Johnson & Johnson is expected to seek EU approval for its COVID-19 jab in late February.
German biotech firm CureVac and US company Novavax, whose vaccines are still undergoing large-scale trials, are tipped to follow suit in May, the document showed.
Merkel reiterated that supply would remain tight for the first three months of 2021 but the pace would pick up quickly once production capacities are enlarged and more vaccines are approved.
“Our pledge that we will be able to offer a vaccine to every citizen by the end of the third quarter still stands,” she said, adding that she understood “the disappointment” of those who had hoped to be inoculated sooner.
