EU preparing legal case against AstraZeneca over vaccine shortfalls

To be honest here in Ireland where majority of vaccinations have been Pfizer people seemed to stop caring about AZ and there is a sizeable chunk of people who are refusing AZ (my own elderly parents and their siblings really scared now and in despair) due to issues recently highlighted (dont shoot messenger, imho risks are small but i can see why some might be hesitant when alternatives are/will be available)

I say the brand damage to AZ due to their own production issues, Oxford due to what seems to be dodgy research trials (still not approved by FDA) and UK where politicians wrapped the vaccine in union jack and hitched it to Brexit bandwagon for jignoistic reasons, means this vaccine is now tainted in peoples eyes with negative associations. Which is a pitty but i see both sides of arguments.

TL.DR a month ago i predicted it be pretty much unusable in europe and thats more or less case. As for AZ if they have broken contracts then yes failure should be punished in courts, but IMNAL! for population at large what matters more is that better vaccines are available faster and this vaccine doesnt lead to further hesitancy.

Does anyone know why all of the geopolitical discourse in the UK and Europe has been around arguing over a small supply, rather than about increasing manufacturing capacity?

There are groups which advocate for that, but they often don't have a large (if any) representation.

I'm still waiting too see long term effects of all adenovirus based vaccines. I'm kinda estimating there to be an increased risk of strokes overall.

But I'm constantly baffled at Germany's vaccine response. Remember that Pfizer's vaccine is developed by the German company and that the president of the European commission used to be Germany's Minister of Family/Labour and Defense.

But in a way that's a result of their arrogance, so well deserved in a way.

EDIT: Wow, the responses are seriously out of this world. The German health minister fumbled ordering fast testing kits. In fact Aldi, Germany's biggest cheap supermarket chain started distributing testing kits faster than the German government[1].

They fumbled through the mask ordering and distribution and by inventing a super complicated voucher that was delayed many times to allow for cheap masks[2].

One of Germanies most important health care organizations leaderships told people to make sure they know there is no mask mandate in the office[3], and that a running nose is not a reason to stay home. This is while there were statewide mask mandates and work at home encouragement elsewhere.

You're right that it doesn't matter where BioNtech is from. What does matter however is that they are considered more safe than any of the other vaccines, and that they delivered hundreds of millions of vaccines to the US and elsewhere.

Let's stop pretending that Germany didn't fumbled through every step of the pandemic, they bought AZ because it was cheap not out of solidarity to the US. They made the rules for the EU and are now looking at AZ as the scapegoat.

Did you guys already forget the Luca app nightmare?

[1] https://www.politico.eu/article/germany-health-minister-jens...

[2] https://tkare.de/en/berechtigungsschein-the-new-voucher-for-...

[3] https://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschland/2021-04/kassenaerztl...

It's split: Hesitation is for sure here, on the other hand plenty people in age ranges its not recommended for here decide to get it anyways. (Here in Germany its not recommended for <60, but not forbidden to be used)