Thread by @jonworth

This 🧵 is a summary of my article for @metropole_vie about 💉 supply in 🇪🇺

You can read the whole piece here:
metropole.at/eu-covid-vacci…

tl;dr: the worst of 🇪🇺's supply woes are behind it now...

1/11

22-29 January was really the low point

22 Jan: AZ scaled back its delivery forecast to the EU for Q1 from 100m to 31m

29 Jan: von der Leyen caused all the controversy by including reference to Art 16 NI Protocol in the transparency mechanism

2/11

But that transparency mechanism was when it all began to turn. For it allowed the EU to explain what vaccines were going where - and also highlight how much of UK's early vaccine success was based on exports from the EU

3/11

It also stemmed the tide of more exports of vaccines to other parts of the world that *themselves* also had production capacity (UK, US), while keeping exports flowing to places that didn't

To date only 1 250k shipment has actually been turned back by the mechanism

4/11

Behind the scenes Thierry Breton and governments of numerous EU Member States (notably Germany and Spain) were sorting out EU-only supply chains for BioNTech and J&J, while headaches with AZ persisted

5/11

Also Pfizer/BioNTech - with the most integrated EU-UK supply chain - was spared completely... because it had been delivering to schedule

There were only 2 public funders of BioNTech in the early phase: the EIB and the German Government

6/11

The decision from September 2020(!) - when BioNTech used the German government investment to purchase the Marburg plant from Novartis - is the single biggest reason why the EU supply is so strong

7/11

BioNTech might be a comparatively expensive vaccine, but its production has been rock solid and scaleable, it remains the most effective vaccine, and to date seems to have had the least problems of side effects

And the EU has *huge* supply of it coming on stream

8/11

Sure, the EU could have been *faster* in the first stage of the pandemic - it did not get the earliest orders. With hindsight the EMA could possibly have approved BioNTech and AZ a little faster. And the EU should perhaps have ensured more EU-only supply chains sooner.

9/11

But as it stands now, EU Member States' vaccines are motoring ahead, driven forward by 250m BioNTech doses due this quarter, and with mRNA vaccines assured into Q3/Q4 and beyond. The EU can afford to plan without AZ.

10/11

Was all of this perfect? No.

But it was not the catastrophe many claimed. The EU's bet on BioNTech paid off. Its vaccine supply is solid, and it's not nervously waiting on the approval of other vaccines to come. It all could be a lot worse!

11/11