Covid: What’s the problem with the EU vaccine rollout?

The European Union has been criticised for the slow pace of coronavirus vaccinations in member states.

It has introduced export controls on vaccines produced in the EU after its rollout was hit by supply problems and delays.

The scheme, set up in June 2020, allows the EU to negotiate the purchase of vaccines on behalf of its member states. It says this can help reduce costs and avoid competition between them.

Member states do not have to join the scheme, but all 27 EU countries chose to do so.

They are still allowed to make separate deals with vaccine makers with which the EU does not have an agreement. Hungary has agreed to buy two million doses of the Russian Sputnik-V vaccine.

The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine was approved for use in the EU on 29 January.

The EU signed a deal for 300 million doses in August, while the UK ordered 100 million doses and signed its deal in May.

But AstraZeneca has had supply problems, which it blamed on manufacturing issues at one plant in Belgium and another in the Netherlands.

Reports suggested deliveries to the EU would be reduced to 31 million - a cut of 60% - in the first quarter of 2021.

This prompted criticism from the EU which says it should not receive fewer doses just because the UK signed a contract earlier. It said AstraZeneca's UK plants "had to deliver".

AstraZeneca said the fact that EU contracts were signed later left less time to resolve problems in the EU supply chain.

It said its agreement with the EU allowed the option of supplying Europe from UK sites, but only once the UK had sufficient supplies. "As soon as we can, we'll help the EU," chief executive Pascal Soriot said.

UK government minister Michael Gove said there would be "no interruption" to UK supplies, which had been "planned, paid for and scheduled".

The EU announced on 29 January that it was introducing export controls on vaccines made in the bloc.

It said this would also apply to vaccines moving between the Republic of Ireland (which is in the EU) and Northern Ireland, overriding part of the Brexit deal for Northern Ireland. After widespread criticism, the EU reversed this decision.

The EU previously placed export controls on personal protective equipment, to make sure member states had enough.

The EU approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in December, having signed a deal for 300 million doses. But the company was unable to supply the 12.5 million doses it had promised by the end of 2020.

Vaccinations in parts of Europe were paused after it temporarily cut deliveries, to increase capacity at its processing plant in Belgium.

The head of BioNTech, Uğur Şahin, said "the process in Europe certainly didn't proceed as quickly and straightforwardly as with other countries".

The EU has doubled its order of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine to 600m doses and the French company Sanofi will help manufacture 125 million doses of the vaccine, starting this summer.

The EU approved the Moderna jab in January but ran into problems here too, with Italy and France both announcing a reduction in supplies.

About 17.3 million doses of the vaccine,a mixture of first and second doses, have been given to people living in the EU, which has a population of 448 million.

In Germany, where 3.3 million doseshad been administered by 8 February, the government has been criticised for lagging behind other countries, despite BioNTech being a German company.

By the same date, 2.1 million jabs had been given in France, with a similar number in Spain and 2.6 million in Italy.

The government says the UK - by contrast - has given more than 13 million doses.

The European Commission says it has reached agreements with three other pharmaceutical companies to purchase hundreds of millions of vaccines, once they pass clinical trials:

The Commission concluded initial talks with two other companies, Novavax, for up to 200 million doses and Valneva, for up to 60 million doses.

A European Commission spokesperson told BBC News the strategy of ordering vaccines from several suppliers was "fundamentally sound" and could "ensure almost two billion doses for European citizens".

After the UK approved the Pfizer vaccine in November (nearly three weeks before the EU regulators), some argued that it was only able to move this quickly because of Brexit.

Reality Check looked into this claim and found that the UK's approval of the jab was actually permitted under EU law - a point made by the head of the UK medicines regulator.

The government said that being outside the EU did allow it to be more nimble in this area.

So, what about the EU vaccine scheme?

The UK could have joined it last year, while it was still in a transition phase with the EU (and following its rules), but it chose not to.

If it had, the UK might not have been able to do as many deals with vaccine companies.

The terms of EU scheme state that participating countries must, "agree not to launch their own procedures for advance purchase of [a] vaccine with the same manufacturers", that the EU has an agreement with.

However, the German government - a participant - signed its own side deal with Pfizer for 30 million extra doses in September.

In January, the European Commission refused to say whether this had broken the terms of the EU scheme.