Countries ability to wage wars and raise debt are linked through history - US Liberty Bonds or UK War Bonds sold to retail investors during WW1 etc. showed that patriotism = powerful investment advice. But what about for funding #UkraineWar? Should the EU get in too? a proposal🧵 2) EU debt is invariably controversial, and probably some would consider the suggestion to market it directly to Europeans to fund fighting a common threat (Russian aggression in Ukraine) would set a "dangerous precedent". But why not? @gmfus we are looking into this, too.

Har nu et par gange læst @JeppeKofod's interview med @ToreKeller om DK's EU politik og et kommende nyt "bredt Europa politisk forlig" i @folketinget. En🧵om implikationerne i det der bliver sagt. information.dk/udland/2022/01… (2) DK i ❤️af EU (ikke mere udenomssnak om "Europa" eller "vores kontinent"... det er EU det her drejer sig om!), som lige nu trues af den største væbnede trussels siden 1989, uden et opgør med forsvarsforbeholdet og de andre forbehold synes "real politisk problematisk", men på

A quick DE thread, but I obviously have no idea really about the outcome of intense negotiations ahead. So just some auxiliary observations: 1) strong centrist vote - both AfD and Linke lose and are now de facto consigned to former East Germany with 75+% of vote in Center. 1/n 2) DE will now almost certainly have a 3-party coalition, as a new inverse GroKo with Scholz as Chancellor seem impossible to accept for CDU. This is a break from DE traditional very stable 2-party coalitions and likely heralds the end of very long chancellorships of 15+y 2/n

Reaching very high levels of immunity from say 90% vaccination rates with more contagious virus variants in circulation seems the ultimate goal for vacc rollouts across the world. Good news is Europe - and UK especially - is reaching such levels for high priority groups now. A 🧵 1) Europe and the US are now facing the challenge of ensuring that up to 90% of also younger age groups ultimately gets vaccinated. Israel - a global frontrunner in vacc rollouts - offer important insights on how to nudge people less personally at risk of covid19 to get jabbed.

An update; Vaccine news are improving across most of the EU as rollout accelerates. HU/MT now near US/UK levels, 3 laggards remains BG, LV and CR, while others roughly on par. Noticeably DE, ES and IT proceeding rapidly through EU vaccination rankings. A 🧵 2) A great communications gift meanwhile was given by @POTUS to the @EU_Commission this week, as US gov now hopes to "vaccinate 70% of adult Americans by July 4th". @vonderleyen could not have wished for more! apnews.com/article/corona…

Time to talk global vaccine exports - a topic where data availability (hopefully) will soon improve as opportunities for "vaccine diplomacy" emerge and - despite the Indian tragedy and glaring global inequalities in vacc access, the news is generally quite good. A 🧵 2) Best news (H/T @ChadBown) is that @pfizer is now FINALLY starting to fulfill international contracts also from US located production, following the (alleged) expiry of de facto contractual bans on doing so. Up to 1mn doses now going to Mexico. 👍 reuters.com/business/healt…

"We don't have enough to be confident to send it abroad"? This is absurd from @POTUS and US vaccine nationalism at its clearest. Consider what amount of vaccines the US has "on the shelves" now, what it has sent to others and what say the EU has done to date? 🧵

https://twitter.com/Quicktake/status/1384959503829975040

1) The US has per the @CDCgov a current unused stockpile of ~63mn FDA approved vacc doses (@Pfizer/ @moderna_tx / J&J), number that due to slowing vaccination rates as Americans who want it has already got it is rising at over 1mn/day.... covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tra…

Time to update the EU Covid vaccine charts. Situation is one of remarkable similarity across EU+NO+IS - with only HU (RU/CH vaccs) and MT (small size) well ahead of rest and BG, LV and CR materially lagging behind EU average. US (now ahead of UK) is well ahead of EU average. 1/n The relative similarity of majority of EU MS' vacc levels is good news and indicates most MS are using essentially all the vaccines they receive now. Bodes well for ability to scale up as supplies increase. EU contrast to diff. vacc rates among US states is remarkable. 2/n

Time to update EU vaccination data; A clearer pic is emerging with MT and HU well ahead due to threshold and timing effect on vacc deliveries (MT) and RU/CH supply (HU), while BG, LV and CR lag behind EU average (Note - NL data a week old) 1/10 Apart from MT/HU at top and BG/LV/CR at bottom, rest of EU27+NO+IS increasingly clustering in the middle as some earlier frontrunners (DK/NO) suspend AZ vaccinations. This = best practices spreading and binding vacc supply (AZ overreliance?) constraints in BG/LV/CR. 2/10

@vonderleyen was earlier today kind enough to update EU vaccine supply data. This was actually very very encouraging, as it highlights that the EU27+NO+IS is on target to be able to vaccinate 70% of its 18y+ population by the END OF JUNE with the 4 currently approved vaccines 1/n Moreover, IF you assume the EU had adopted the UK/US "NO Exports stance" Q1 supply would have been 144mn (not 100mn) and assuming no export + @AstraZeneca contract compliance would yielded ~200mn in Q1 for the EU+NO+IS, or about double the actual 100mn. 2/n

Hvad skal EU - og derfor DK - goere for at undgaa at den nuvaerende vaccine situation gentages i en fremtidig pandemi som naeppe er 100aar vaek? Det drejer sig om penge og om at EU har nok af dem fra start - mit forslag fra @PIIE + traad #DKpol #dkmedier piie.com/blogs/realtime… EU har allerede en af verdens stoerste pharma-sektorer og er verdens stoerste producent/eksportoer af vacciner, saa alle ingredienserne er her allerede. Den tilstraekkelige mobilisering kraever blot en mere offensiv EU politik end noget stoerre parti i DK @Spolitik @venstredk 2/9

What lessons should the EU and its member states learn to prevent its current troubled vaccine rollout from being repeated in a future where pandemics seem likely to be more frequent? In a new @PIIE piece, I lay out why it is mostly about money! 1/7 piie.com/blogs/realtime… In any pandemic where vaccines are quickly and successfully developed, it is invariable that supply constraints and a "zero sum" game develop among advanced economies desperate to inoculate their populations. Having, as the EU does, a large domestic pharma-sector is an 2/7

DK's vaccinationshastighed synes stagnerende - igaar 16-17k/dag. Det er imidlertid ca. det tempo man maa forvente i marts, jf. sidste uges SSI vaccine leverance update, samt annonceringen af en 100k/dag "stoerre skala test" i de kommende uger. 1 hurtig 1/n ssi.dk/aktuelt/nyhede… model viser at ca. 16.900/dag (+ en successfuld 100k/dag test) bruger de af SSI forventede vacciner vi faar i marts og indtil paaske. No great - men bedst tilgaengelige data @mikaelmilhoj? Inden man skriger paa handling fra @Statsmin og flere DK regeringsbesoeg hos 2/n

:-) - so time to update EU vacc data (again), since some new developments (and data) have emerged. MT still by a margin the most vacc'ing EU member, but HU has now moved into 2., ahead of DK, CY and NO. @DrAlisonSmith kindly showed me the NL dashboard 1/15 coronadashboard.government.nl/landelijk/vacc… with Dutch data (implying I've been misreporting the nationally available Dutch weekly data by jab). "old" data from Feb 28 now included, though if you use the March 6th total# for NL of ~1.6mn, you'd get 9.2% of total pop, or a place between AT and ES. Consistent data 2/15

Time to Update EU vacc data, where last week saw some noticeable developments. MT still by a margin the most vacc'ing EU member, but HU has now moved into 2., ahead of DK, CY and NO. BG, LV and (remarkably) NL CR LU remain bottom. Wealth and imminent elections matters not? 1/15 Some catchup among MS is happening, but divergence and vacc-speed remains far apart between top & bottom. Recent accelerations by HU, CY and NO show however that "convergence to the top" is possible. BG and LV similarly picked up speed, though NL and LU much less so (yet?). 2/15

Updating EU vaccine data, two things stand out. 1) Good news = supply will quickly pick up now. 2) Far Less good new = no "convergence to the top" among EU MS, raising risk of lack of uniform rollout acceleration in coming weeks with higher supply. 1/11 MT remains by a margin the most efficient EU MS rollout (smallest pop MS likely benefit from lower threshold effects in supply = more vaccs/pop), followed by DK at 8.5%, high-jumper NO at 7.3% and PL at 7.2%. 2/11

It is increasingly clear that the EU vaccine supply problems have bottomed out and that the news will be considerably better going forward. This shifts the "vaccine delivery problem" firmly on to the EU MS, whose capacity to quickly scale up roll outs may be severely tested. 1/n The recent good news are numerous: Today an additional delivery 200mn @BioNTech_Group/@Pfizer vaccines to the EU, incl. crucially 75mn in Q2 was announced. 2/n biontechse.gcs-web.com/news-releases/…

EU vaccine deliveries appear to be slipping from both @pfizer/@BioNTech_Group and @AstraZeneca, causing supply constraints to begin to bite in more MS. Yet despite increasing vaccination speeds in some MS and the EU claiming to be distributing vaccs by population differences 1/13 between member states remain stark on Jan 25 ranging from just 0.4% of total pop vacc'ed in BG, 0.8% in NL to 3.6% in DK and 4.5% in MT, while 2. jabs range from ZERO in 9 MS to 0.34% in SN and 0.46% in DK with an EU27+NO total of 1.9% and 0.12% 2. jabs. These remain HUGE 2/13

@joebiden wants 100mn Americans vaccinated in 100days - that means ~115mn or just over 1/3 of all Americans will have received at least first jab by late April. That frankly is a pretty timid and certainly NOT a moonshot, or even enough to get out of lockdowns soon enough. 1/13 @joebiden's plans though are much more ambitious than say France and @EmmanuelMacron, who outrageously just aims to vaccinate 15mn (a little more than 1/4 of pop) elderly and chronically ill before the summer. 2/13 gouvernement.fr/info-coronavir…

Europe has gotten off to a slow start in its Covid-vaccination program. Reasons are several; 1) Full (not emergency like in UK/US) approval of vaccines takes longer. Decision always debatable, but NOT clear that the EMA "didn't do a proper/crucial job" 1/6 lemonde.fr/planete/articl… 2) EU purchased too few vaccines. True, but uncertainty high in the summer of 2020 about which vaccines would ultimately prove successful, while the opposite concern of "too many EU vaccines" is morally dubious, as the EU must donate them before expiry to needy Dev-countries. 2/6

OK - so what to do now about HU/PL and RoL, since they are obviously not budging? One option is to wait it out and hope the two countries will capitulate, as they need EU money more that Southern members (who have access also to ECB asset purchases). 1/n ft.com/content/b1d3e7… This strategy has many "institutional merits", as there are huge legal, political and administrative advantages in leaving the current EU-level deal in place IF HU/PL eventually fold first. Maybe they will, but maybe they won't and it might be time for the EU to take out the 2/n