Desperate EU tries to block AstraZeneca vaccine doses to Britain as UK tells Brussels to ‘grow up’

DESPERATE EU bureaucrats tried to block AstraZeneca vaccine exports to Britain last night as the UK told the bloc to “grow up”.

The European Commission said it would ensure a jab facility in the Netherlands would keep the remedies in the EU.

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Run by drugs firm Halix, the Leiden-based plant is listed as a supplier of vaccines in both the contracts that AstraZeneca has signed with Britain and the European Union.

An EU official said: “The Brits are insisting that the Halix plant in the Netherlands must deliver the drug substance produced there to them. That doesn’t work.

“What is produced in Halix has to go to the EU.”

Britain has insisted that contracts must be respected and UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace told the bloc to "grow up".

This comes as EU member states are set to debate a vaccine export ban to the UK on Thursday.

EU WHAT?

Meanwhile, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen threatened to join forces with France and Germany to hold hostage over 19 million AZ jabs scheduled to be shipped to the UK.

Number 10 has told the EU to “grow up” over their blockade threats as their rollouts continue to flop behind Britain’s.

Combined with a sharp rise in infections, the EU's shambolic jab programme has seen large swathes of the continent plunged back into lockdown in the past week.

As of Saturday, states in the bloc had administered just 10.4 jab doses per 100 people compared with 42.7 jabs per 100 in the UK.

UK Defence Secretary Mr Wallace said the EU would suffer “severe reputational” damage if it tried interfering with vaccine exports.

He told Sky News that “the world is watching" adding “the grown-up thing would be for the European Commission and some of the European leaders to not indulge in rhetoric but to recognise the obligations that we all have."

But the EU official said the bloc was not breaking any contract.

AstraZeneca has not yet sought approval in the EU for Halix, but the official and a second EU source said the request was on its way.

Without regulatory approval, vaccines produced at Halix cannot be used in the EU.

EXPORT BAN

An internal AstraZeneca document shows that the company expects EU approval on March 25.

AZ has declined to comment on the amount of vaccines that are currently stockpiled at Halix.

The EU official said the factory had already produced shots, but was not able to quantify the output.

Under the bloc's contract with AstraZeneca, vaccines must be produced before approval and be delivered immediately afterwards.

Two factories in Britain run by Oxford Biomedica and Cobra Biologics are also listed as suppliers to the EU in the contract with AstraZeneca, but no vaccine has so far been shipped from the UK to the continent, despite Brussels’ earlier requests.

Officials have said that Cobra is not fully operational.

AstraZeneca told EU officials that the UK is using a clause in its supply contract that prevents export of its vaccines until the British market is fully served, EU officials said.

This comes as Britain's vaccine rollout faces a two-month delay if EU members states go ahead with the jab export ban.

And according to analytics firm Airfinity, the move would NOT provide a significant boost to beleaguered vaccine rollouts in the European Union.

Research shows that the number doses kept within the bloc would speed up EU vaccinations by "just over a week."

'GROW UP'

Yet, an export ban of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine made in Belgium and Germany would delay every British adult receiving a first jab until August 5, reports the .