Thread by @DaveKeating

BREAKING: The European Commission has adopted a regulation making the export of vaccines subject to an export authorisation.

Companies will need to inform authorities before they export vaccines made in the EU out of the EU.

Press conference happening now.

The vaccine export restriction mechanism is time-limited till the end of March and only covers the 6 vaccines that have been part of EU joint procurement.

"Commitments need to be kept, and contracts are binding," says Health Commissioner @SKyriakidesEU.

"Humanitarian shipments will not be effected," Kyriakides says. The EU's COVAX programme getting vaccines to developing countries will also not be affected.

VP @VDombrovskis says 92 countries are exempted from EU's new potential vaccines export ban, including Western Balkan neighbours, EFTA (🇨🇭🇳🇴🇮🇸🇱🇮) and developing countries. He does not list UK as being exempt.

But..."the measure is not targeting any particular country," he says.

"We're not protecting ourselves against specific country, and we're not in competition or a race against any country," says EU Health Commissioner @SKyriakidesEU.

"The only race we're in is against this virus".

Confirmed - the UK is not on the list of countries exempted from this potential export ban.

Virtually every other European country, except Russia, is.
ec.europa.eu/commission/pre…

Commission is adopting this mechanism because it thinks #AstraZeneca doses contracted to EU were instead given to UK.

"The EU invested large amounts in the development and production of vaccines in EU, this was meant to ensure quick delivery upon authorisation" says Kyriakides.

UK & Russia are the only European countries not on exemption list for potential EU vaccine export bans because they're the 2 without any formalised relationship with EU (EFTA, accession, association, etc).

All other developed countries not in EU structures are also not exempt.