Table of Contents
THE BEGINNING
- The calls began in December, as the United States prepared to administer its first batches of COVID-19 vaccine. Even then, it was clear that the European Union was a few weeks behind, and its leaders wanted to know what they could learn from their American counterparts.
- The questions were the same, from President Emmanuel Macron of France, President Ursula von der Leyen of the European Commission, and Alexander De Croo, prime minister of Belgium.
GAP INCREASED
- Since then, the rollout gap between Europe and the United States has widened, and some of the countries hardest hit early in the pandemic are facing a deadly third wave of infections.
- France, large parts of Italy, and other regions are back in lockdown. Roughly 20,000 Europeans die of COVID-19 each week.
GAP INCREASED
- Vaccine salvation remains, for now, tantalizingly out of reach. Only about 10% of Europeans have received a first dose, compared with 23% in the U.S. and 39% in Britain.
- There is no single culprit. Rather, a cascade of small decisions have led to increasingly long delays. The bloc was comparatively slow to negotiate contracts with drugmakers. Its regulators were cautious and deliberative in approving some vaccines.
WHAT WENT WRONG?
- But the biggest explanation, one that has haunted the bloc for months, is as much philosophical as it was operational. European governments are often seen in the U.S. as free-spending, liberal bastions. This time, though, it was Washington that threw billions at drugmakers and cosseted their business.
- Brussels, by comparison, took a conservative, budget-conscious approach that left the open market largely untouched. And it has paid for it.
WHAT WENT WRONG?
- In short, the answer today is the same as it was in December, Slaoui said.
- The bloc shopped for vaccines like a customer. The United States basically went into business with the drugmakers, spending much more heavily to accelerate vaccine development, testing and production.
WHAT WENT WRONG?
- Compared with nearly all the rest of the world, the European Union is in an admirable position. Its leaders say it remains feasible to vaccinate 70% of the continent by this summer. The bloc has ordered enough doses to fully vaccinate its population at least three times, to the consternation of countries that will wait years for full coverage.But Europeans are stung, especially, to see Britain’s rollout going so well after the country exited the bloc. Everyone wants to know why the EU has not triumphed.
‘Not Equipped for a Gunfight’
- The European Union trailed the U.S. and Britain from the start.
- Washington had already spent billions on clinical trials and manufacturing by the time Europe decided to pool its resources and negotiate as a bloc. In mid-June, the European Commission, the bloc’s executive branch, announced a joint vaccine purchase with a $3.2 billion pot.
NEGOTIATIONS
- The United States made the negotiations easy — its critics say far too easy — by signing away any right to intellectual property and absolving the drug companies of any liability if the vaccines disappointed.
- Washington paid for the development and the trials; the companies had essentially nothing to lose.
The Wrong Horses
- European institutions are, by design, risk-averse. One of the founding tenets of the European Union is called the precautionary principle: The bloc errs on the side of caution when risks are unclear.
- That, some analysts have said, hurt the bloc. German leaders argued for a heftier bet on vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and CureVac, but they were based on unproven messenger RNA technology and were more expensive.
The Wrong Horses
- So the bloc relied heavily on AstraZeneca for its early rollout plans, a bet that had repercussions from the beginning. Italy, for example, embraced Europe’s bet on AstraZeneca doses because they were cheaper and did not require extreme storage temperatures.
- But then Italian regulators recommended against giving the vaccine to older adults until more data were available, leaving a country with the oldest population in Europe more vulnerable to the pandemic.
The Wrong Horses
- The bloc fell further behind when national authorities in Germany, France, Italy, and elsewhere raised concerns about dangerous clots and bleeding, and temporarily suspended use of the vaccine.
- Although the World Health Organization and European regulators reaffirmed its safety, the damage was done. Only 1 in 5 French people now trust the AstraZeneca vaccine, according to a poll by the Elabe Institute published Tuesday.
A Lack of Flexibility
- Early this month, Toon Vanagt, a Belgian tech entrepreneur, accompanied his 77-year-old father to a vaccination center north of Brussels. Vanagt, 47, was not eligible for the vaccine, but a worker offered him a leftover shot, which he gladly accepted.
- Many European countries are also stockpiling doses to guarantee that everyone who receives a first injection will receive the second dose on time. The United States and Britain have been more flexible, erring on the side of giving more first injections.
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