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The insight into the contract with the vaccine manufacturer Curevac hardly sheds light on the EU's vaccine deals
Photo: Fleig / Eibner-Pressefoto / imago images / Eibner
As of today, scenes in the European Parliament have been playing out as if it were about state secrets.
MEPs must hand in their cell phones before entering the reading room.
You are only allowed to come alone, assistants are not allowed.
They have 45 minutes to study the 60 pages of the contract between the EU and the vaccine manufacturer Curevac.
During this time, only handwritten notes are allowed.
With security so tight, the eagerly anticipated result seems sobering.
"I'm not much smarter now than I was before," says French MEP Pascal Canfin, who, as head of the Committee on Environment and Public Health, was one of the first to have access to the contract between the EU and the German vaccine manufacturer Curevac.
Which country receives how much vaccine and when is still a secret
The reason for the disappointment: Central passages of the document have been blackened out.
The need for explanation would be great.
The Commission has now ordered 1.5 billion doses of corona vaccines from a total of six companies, with options for 760 million more - a gigantic investment.
But which country should receive how many doses of vaccination and when, or how liability was regulated in the event of damage to the health of vaccinated persons, is still unknown to the public.
The parts of the Curevac contract that have now been disclosed do little to change this, as Canfin criticizes.
The passage in which the quarterly agreed delivery quantities are listed has been blackened.
The same applies to two out of six paragraphs that deal with liability.
"It is not a way of assessing how this issue was dealt with," Canfin said.
Even the price of the vaccine had been made unrecognizable, although it was already publicly known, after a Belgian state secretary apparently accidentally tweeted a table with the prices of all vaccines ordered by the EU.
Accordingly, a dose of Curevac should cost 10 euros.
Canfin now demands more openness.
"That can only have been the first of many steps," says the Frenchman about the partial disclosure of the Curevac contract.
However, not only the vaccine manufacturers, but also the EU states are in demand.
Because this is the only way to clarify how many vaccine doses from which manufacturer each EU country will receive per month.
According to reports, not even the EU Commission has these figures.
The reason: Although the Brussels authority is in charge of ordering the vaccines, the actual purchase and distribution are a matter for the member countries.
After all: the French government has now published its figures.
"The other states should follow suit," Canfin says.
Only one thing became clear in this regard on Tuesday in Brussels: The vaccine quantities that member countries have ordered from pharmaceutical manufacturers on their own - and possibly illegally - bypassing the EU will only be delivered after the doses ordered by the EU.
The priority of EU doses is clearly regulated in the contracts, said Sandra Gallina, Director of the Commission's Directorate-General for Health, at a hearing in the European Parliament on Tuesday morning.
"These vaccines are so late that their public health benefits are zero"
MEP Pascal Canfin
For Canfin, this is proof that Germany's going it alone, which has caused irritation in Brussels and some EU states, is ultimately useless: "These vaccines come so late that their public health benefits are zero."
On January 4th, the federal government publicly admitted the existence of bilateral contracts with several manufacturers.
But vaccine chief buyer Gallina sees no problem in this because, in your opinion, there are no such contracts.
"I haven't seen anyone before and I don't think I'll ever see one," said the Italian, creating a surreal moment.
To their knowledge, these contracts "do not exist".
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