EU’s slow roll-out of Covid-19 vaccines

The European Union’s awkward handling of the Covid-19 vaccination rollout has its roots in when orders were placed with pharmaceutical companies and when approval was granted to use vaccines


EU AND UK COVID-19 VACCINE PROCUREMENT COMPARISON
Vaccine ordered		Vaccine approved for use

Vaccines approved for use in EU

AstraZeneca
Total doses: 300m, plus option to buy 100m more
Jun 17: Team led by Ursula Von der Leyen, European Commission President, takes over vaccine procurement
Aug 27: 300m doses
Dec 27: EU begins vaccinations
Jan 29: Vaccine approved

Pfizer/BioNTech
Total doses: 500m, plus option to buy 100m more
Nov 11: 200m doses
Dec 15: 100m doses
Dec 21: Vaccine approved 
Jan 8: 200m doses

Moderna
Total doses: 160m
Nov 25: 80m doses
Dec 15: 80m doses
Jan 6: Vaccine approved

Vaccines ordered but yet to be approved

Oct 7: Johnson & Johnson* (200m doses)
Sep 18: Sanofi-GSK (300m doses)
Nov 19: CureVac (225m doses, plus option for 180m more)

May 2020 Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan 2021 Feb

EU also holding exploratory talks with Novavax (100m doses + 100m option) and Valneva (30m doses + 30m option)

Totals	Approved doses: 960m	Pending approval: 725m	Total doses: 1,685m	Doses per person: 3.76


Vaccines approved for use in UK

AstraZeneca
Total doses: 100m
May 24: 100m doses
Dec 8: UK begins vaccinations†
Dec 30: Vaccine approved

Pfizer/BioNTech
Total doses: 40m
Jul 20: 30m doses
Nov 9: 10m doses
Dec 2: Vaccine approved

Moderna
Total doses: 17m 
Nov 16: 5m doses
Nov 30: 2m doses
Jan 8: 10m doses
Vaccine approved

Vaccines ordered but yet to be approved
 
Jul 20: Valneva (60m doses)
Jul 29: Sanofi-GSK (60m doses) 
Aug 17: Novavax (60m doses)
Johnson & Johnson* (30m doses + 22m option)
Feb 1: Valneva (40m doses)

May 2020 Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan 2021 Feb

Totals	Approved doses: 157m	Pending approval: 250m	Total doses: 407m	Doses per person: 6.10

 
*Single dose achieves immunity. †First country to begin vaccinating against Covid-19. Surplus doses can be redirected or donated to other countries.
EU nations permitted to buy other makes of vaccine – Hungary is buying Russia’s Sputnik V and China’s Sinopharm
Sources: Guardian, Spiegel International, Financial Times, European Commision, ITV 
Picture: Getty Images 
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