London - Sana
After political and economic disagreements and skirmishes that continued for more than four years and ended with Britain's exit from the European Union late last year, a new war broke out between the two parties, but this time over anti-Coronavirus vaccines, amid the European bloc's threat to prevent millions of doses of the vaccine from reaching the British.
The new dispute between London and Brussels revolves around, according to the BBC, about the European Commission’s plans to impose a new mechanism to prevent the export of anti-Corona vaccines, amid fears of facing an acute shortage of these vaccines. This step raises Britain’s great fear of the possibility of stopping the flow of the Pfizer vaccine. Biontech, which is mainly manufactured in Belgium, has concluded a deal in London to purchase 40 million doses of it.
The European Union’s move to prevent the export of Corona vaccines comes in response to the announcement by the British-Swedish company, "AstraZeneca Oxford", that the Union received its share of the vaccine doses late, as it was expected to reach 80 million doses by the end of next March, but the company said that it will provide only 25 million By this date.
The British newspaper The Independent considered that the European Union would use "all legitimate means" to obstruct the export of the Pfizer anti-Corona vaccine to Britain, amid the shortage in supplies, noting that it had seen a leaked letter by the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, in which he said that Brussels is studying "urgent measures" to ensure supplies of the vaccine to residents the Union.
The political aspect of the vaccine war between Britain and the European Union is clearly evident, as London insists on highlighting its ability to vaccinate twice as many European countries as a whole. It is also trying to focus on the gains from the separation from the European Union and the success of the Brexit process and promoting this idea among the British.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week bragged to European leaders at the summit devoted to the Corona pandemic that the European Union has "the largest vaccine portfolio in the world" and that the vaccination campaigns that began late last month will secure immunity for three quarters of the Union's population by next summer, but what Most of the governments of the member states of the Union soon announced the rescheduling of the vaccination campaigns after they reported the delay in delivering the promised quantities from AstraZeneca, which Pfizer had preceded a few days ago, by announcing also the delay in the delivery of the scheduled payments in the first half of next month.
The European Union, which funded the AstraZeneca vaccine at Oxford University with more than 350 million dollars, is now threatening to recover part of this amount. While British Prime Minister Boris Johnson confirms that the distribution of the Oxford vaccine will continue, media reports and other press in Britain have added to the tensions between London and Brussels with Some have published articles with titles such as "Vaccine War" and "The European Union bans our vaccines."
