AstraZeneca Failed To Meet The Obligation To Deliver COVID-19 Vaccines, European Union Prepares Legal Steps

Vaccine AstraZeneca. (Wikimedia Commons / gencat cat)

JAKARTA - The European Commission is working on legal proceedings against AstraZeneca, after the producer of the COVID-19 vaccine stopped sending vaccines to the European Union.

The plan marks a bold move by the European Union to cut ties with AstraZeneca, after the company repeatedly failed to meet scheduled vaccine supplies, impacting vaccination programs in Europe.

News of this legal case was first reported on Thursday by Politico. An EU official involved in talks with the drugmaker confirmed the EU is preparing to sue the company.

"The EU countries have to decide whether they (will) participate. It's about fulfilling deliveries by the end of the second quarter," the official said.

The issue was discussed on Wednesday during a meeting with EU diplomats, officials and a diplomat said. Politico, citing five unnamed European diplomats, reported that the majority of EU countries at the meeting said they would support suing the company.

There was no immediate response from AstraZeneca on Thursday for a request for comment. A spokesman for the European Commission was not immediately available for comment.

To note, Brussels in March sent a legal letter to AstraZeneca in the first step, from a potential legal procedure to read further.

When the deadline for replies expired this month, a Commission spokesman said the matter had been discussed in a meeting with AstraZeneca. However, the EU is still seeking further clarification from the company on a number of extraordinary points.

The spokesperson did not elaborate further, but details of a letter published by the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera indicated that the European Union is seeking clarification on what it considers to be a delayed application to EU regulators for approval of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Brussels also questioned how AstraZeneca spent more than 224 million euros (270 million US dollars) given by the European Union in September to purchase vaccine ingredients and for which the company has not provided sufficient documents to confirm the purchase.

Under the contract, the company has committed to do its best to make sense, to deliver 180 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine to the European Union in the second quarter, for a total of 300 million in the period from December 2020 to June 2021.

However, AstraZeneca said in a statement on March 12 that it would only ship a third of that. The EU letter was sent a week after the statement.

Under the contract, the parties agree that the Belgian court will be responsible for settling unresolved disputes.

The European Union has decided not to take the option of purchasing an extra 100 million doses of AstraZeneca under the contract, an official said, after supply delays and safety concerns about very rare cases of blood clots linked to the vaccine.