Ministers didn’t want to entrust success of vaccination programme to Brussels at a time of significant cross-Channel tensions over Brexit trade talks
In the race to secure access to a Covid-19 vaccine, the UK Government was fully aware that it had some significant disadvantages compared to larger entities such as the US and the EU.
Britain was always going to have less buying power than the biggest economies, and less political influence with which to bend companies to its will.
One option would have been to join the EU’s vaccines procurement scheme, an offer available to the UK because the post-Brexit transition period was still in train at the time the pandemic broke out.
The Government decided to opt out of the scheme – partly, no doubt, on political grounds given the Prime Minister’s pro-Brexit views, but also because ministers thought it would be better to leverage the advantages Britain does have rather than entrust the success of the vaccination programme to Brussels at a time of significant cross-Channel tensions over the trade talks.
‘At a disadvantage’
Kate Bingham, the venture capitalist who led the Vaccines Taskforce, said: “We were clearly at a disadvantage in terms of size and buying power so the way we chose to address that was by being nimble, and as co-operative and supportive as we possibly could be.”
Britain acted early – while the EU was still negotiating with member states to agree a shared approach – and identified seven promising vaccine candidates. The taskforce prioritised guaranteed supply over price: the UK is believed to be paying more per dose than the EU, reasoning that a rapid vaccination programme more than pays for itself.
The Government worked closely with potential suppliers, above all the University of Oxford which was persuaded to team up with UK-based AstraZeneca rather than a foreign pharmaceutical firm. And there was also a major element of luck: five out of the seven vaccines which Ms Bingham secured have produced successful results after their clinical trials, with three being approved by the British regulator.
The total number of doses promised to the UK by the manufacturers comes to 367 million – enough to cover the whole country three times over, even though most require two doses to be administered. It is likely that batches left over will be donated to poorer countries whose vaccination programmes are lagging behind.
Source: The i
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