Quote:
Originally Posted by Grant66
The UK signed the contract with AZ a day later than the EU signed theirs.
It all comes down to how well the contracts were drafted. Spoiler: the EU didn't do a very good job of writing theirs.
Better and more in-depth explanation:
https://www.politico.eu/article/the-...eca-contracts/ |
Way back in April 2020 UK government set up a deal with AZ to be a partner and coughed up £65million to set up better research and production facilities. While the EU haggled over price ( as if the AZ vaccine isn't cheap enough already ) the UK put their money where their mouth was... The UK contract was much more comprehensive than the EU one because UK was a partner in the research and production of the vaccine, which in the results of Public Health Scotland real world data published less than a week ago was more effective ( 94% vs 85% ) than the Pfizer one at keeping people from needing hospital care.
Extract from the linked article
Most important, however, is that it meant that the British government was “effectively a major shareholder” in the jab’s development as early as April. After Oxford and AstraZeneca agreed to team up at the end of April, for example, the British government filled seats on Oxford-AstraZeneca joint liaison committees.