UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday that European Union leaders have given him assurance that the bloc does not want to ban exports of COVID-19 vaccines manufactured in European plants, amid a fresh row with the UK-Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca over supplies
LONDON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 22nd March, 2021) UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday that European Union leaders have given him assurance that the bloc does not want to ban exports of COVID-19 vaccines manufactured in European plants, amid a fresh row with the UK-Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca over supplies.
"I'm reassured by talking to EU partners over the last few months that they don't want to see blockades. I think that's very, very important. I've talked to our friends repeatedly over period, we're all facing the same pandemic, we all have the same problems," Johnson told reporters during a visit to a BAE Systems factory in Lancashire, England.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday that the EU was prepared to stop exports of vaccines destined to countries that were producing their own doses and not exporting them in turn.
Three days later, von der Leyen was more explicit and said that her message was directed at the UK-Swedish company AstraZeneca for not fulfilling its delivery obligations with the European bloc.
"This is a message to AstraZeneca: You fulfil your part of the deal toward Europe before you start to deliver to other countries," the European commission president told Germany's Funke Media Group in an interview published on Saturday.
An eventual ban on the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford could hinder the UK vaccination campaign, which has so far seen over half of the UK adult population, or 27.6 million people, having their first dose of the vaccine in just 100 days.
The UK government expects that by July 31, all adults in the country should have been offered a COVID-19 vaccine, but a study published by The Guardian warned that an eventual ban on vaccine exports from the EU would delay the UK's vaccine program for at least two months.
The PA Media news agency reported earlier that Johnson already spoke last week with von der Leyden and his counterparts from the Netherlands and Belgium, and will be speaking with the rest of the leaders before the EU's online summit on Thursday.
