Brexit is making Britain more efficient in Europe?

A vaccine made in the EU was rolled out in the UK a full 2 weeks ahead of the EU.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9014751/Why-UK-approved-Pfizer-vaccine-Europe.html

While the EU and China signed a deal, MEPs (Members of European Parliament) have vowed to block this deal...
https://www.express.co.uk/news/poli...-european-parliament-beijing-hong-kong-latest

UK not being in the EU, not only hasn't entered into that deal, but because of the same concerns over China, has opted to ban these imports from entering Britain.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/13704227/britain-halt-goods-slavery-china/

The UK and The EU seem to be on the page, but because of Brexit, The UK's acting more efficiently now even leading in Europe perhaps. This is proof that big governments aren't the answer, and only slows things down.

 

....I was thinking of the phrase....It's easy to make a functional organisation dysfunctional but you can't make a dysfunctional organisation functional....aye well so much disconnect within a dysfunctional secretariat...meh...no wonder it won't work in the long term. Ah well...who gives a crap....coz we're out......bwahahahaha

 

Early days but for sure it will be easier now we are away from the Union to decision make and implement laws and decisions with more haste.

A Government the size of EU will always struggle to get things done, things that suit a Frenchman may not necessarily suit the Romanian and so on..

Add to that the specific agendas of certain governments within the block and it must be a nightmare getting things done.

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...-EU-vaccine-shambles-calls-advert-Brexit.html

German media now turning on the EU over their handling of the roll out calling it an advert for Brexit.
One AstraZeneca employee said that they 'understand Brexit' now.

 

The EU's health commissioner last night insisted Britain should not receive priority – even though the UK signed a contract with AstraZeneca three months before the bloc did.

Stella Kyriakides said: 'We reject the logic of first come, first served. That may work in a butcher's shop but not in contracts and not in our advanced purchase agreements.'

But while AstraZeneca committed to 'even closer' co-ordination with EU officials, the company stuck firmly to its guns, saying it had been 'open' with bloc leaders about the 'complexities' of scaling up its vaccine production.

The firm also left a small but poignant sting in the tail, with a reminder to European leaders of its commitment to provide millions of vaccines to people across the continent 'at no profit' during the pandemic.

A spokesman last night told MailOnline: 'Our CEO Pascal Soriot was pleased to participate in a meeting this evening with the EU's Vaccine Steering Board.

'We had a constructive and open conversation about the complexities of scaling up production of our vaccine, and the challenges we have encountered.

'We have committed to even closer co-ordination, to jointly chart a path for the delivery of our vaccine over the coming months as we continue our efforts to bring our vaccine to millions of Europeans at no profit during the pandemic.'

It comes as sources said Britain has enough vaccines to last this year and meet its targets and could end up distributing them to other countries anyway.

Meanwhile an industry insider rubbished fears Brussels may try to divert the UK's vaccines as 'political rhetoric', but warned if it did it 'would be a human rights issue for millions of people'.

 

First of all, I don't understand why in UK you are still so interested in EU matters ... do you already miss the Union?

Humor aside, it's possible that UK is more efficient now [like the other way round]. So what?
UK and EU are different entities.

Two words about the matter of the Astrazeneca vaccines: I'm with London about this.
EU can complain as it wants, but UK considered that vaccine valid well before than the Union and it's correct that the Corporation honors the British contract first. May be about this I'm influenced by the matter of fact that Italy wasn't relying on Astrazenica vaccine to accelerate the vaccination of the population ... we were anyway going to receive a tiny quantity of that vaccine. We are relying on other vaccines to accelerate [the Italian one included, obviously].

 

Yesterday's headlines...

We was happy doing our own thing not caring about the EU, but the EU has other ideas.

 

EU has got a matter with Astrazeneca ... not with UK ...
If Astrazeneca did the same with US & India, EU will complain that it's not correct that US & India get the priority.
But I repeat, it's more a German matter [and Germany bought vaccine doses on its own ... regardless EU ...]. This actually doesn't touch the entire Union.

In any case, the Indian producer of Astrazeneca [Serum Institute of India] is going to send millions of doses to the Arab countries soon [with good peace of EU and UK ...].

 

The EU messed up when it cancelled Germany's order, wasn't the only EU country who's order it cancelled.

Which is testament to the old adage 'big government just doesn't work', making Britain lead in Europe who were able to act faster.
If EU didn't step in and cancel Germany's order then maybe Germany would be where Britain is now, it's not about being faster, but having things done faster is a result of efficiency, Brexit Britain so far seems to be leading in Europe, it's been 28 days and we've already banned Chinese imports from slave labour with Canada and USA, while MEPs vow to block the EU/China Investment Agreement known as CAI because of human rights complaints, an agreement that had the UK has still have been in the EU, would have been a part of, and wouldn't have been able to ban Chinese imports linked to slavery.
Had the EU have not stepped in and messed with countries orders in the EU, than maybe the company could have gotten ready better.
The UK worked with the company as did the EU apparently, but the EU messed up the order and UK invested into it with Oxford to come up with it and make it.
There are to date 4 plants in Europe, 2 in the UK, 2 in the EU that produce this.
But the supply line is dependent on factors outside of AstraZenca's control, based in the EU.

 

I'm ok with this: it's market economy. From the perspective of the other EU members it wasn't correct that Germany bought vaccines on itself [we decided together that EU had to buy, not this or that single member. EU haven't stepped it ... that what we decided and Germany has tried and be smart like a fox ...]. With Astrazenica's vaccine there is also the problem that it's not suitable for elders, so that it's not so urgent to use it.
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/28/...eneca-vaccine-coronavirus-grm-intl/index.html
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55839885

Anyway I appreciate you're so interested in EU.
Unfortunately I have to follow BBC to know something about UK [here the Kingdom has almost disappeared from TV news].

 

The numbers German media ran with this week were also comically wrong, experts had to tell Germany that 8% of people in the study being over the age of 65 doesn't mean that the vaccine is 8% effective for the over 65s.
I like how the EU got it wrong but somehow blame AstraZeneca and even vow to steal UK supplies when UK has more than enough and would probably start giving it to other countries.

 

The curiosity about the vaccine produced by Astrazeneca is that it's partially Italian ... [IRBM participated to its development].

This detail aside, Italy is waiting for 215,000,000 of doses [in large part of vaccines which require one shot].
We are a bit on late with the first phase because of Pfeizer/BionTech not because Astrazeneca.
Anyway Astrazenica was one of the main suppliers between the end of the first trimester and the second trimester 2021.
But our "game changer" is going to be J&J [with a one shot vaccine].

As usual Italians are cautious [and we find a way to carry on]. Things here are getting slowly better thanks to our "rainbow lockdown", but the situation is still heavy and it will keep on improving slowly until late Spring when the J&J vaccine will have [we hope so, according to our plans] started a new phase. If in the meanwhile Astrazeneca will deliver at least the first supply and this will help.

 

....yeah...well they can suck the big one......that's the issue with having a secretariat and so many disparate members....large bureaucracies by their very nature don't react well to fluid commercial situations. Tough shyte for them

 

The matter is becoming interesting.

In the meanwhile Russia is offering 100,000,000 doses of its vaccine Sputnik to EU.
https://www.itv.com/news/2021-01-29...strazeneca-contract-amid-vaccine-shortage-row

It's a while that Russia is getting close again with EU. It would be curious to see this process developing further.

 

The CCP already own Merkel, and the EU told Biden to act kinder to Communist Cuba and Communist China. I hope Biden rejected this or that nobody listens to the EU when they say things like that. @AlpinLuke
I'd hate to be off of the USSR than off of the EU.

 

Our good friend Vladimir Vladimirovic [Putin says to be a good friend of Italians ...] is probably looking for a way to restart the commercial relationships with EU and to attract again EU investments. Evidently at Moscow they hope to see EU sanctions lifted [at least partially] and so they are showing the will to help us.

EU will evaluate. Personally I wouldn't exclude this possibility.

 

As an aside note, in EU someone has already approved the Russian vaccine. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55747623

 

It seems AstraZeneca have released that contract with the EU and legal experts claim it's unsustainable
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...g-Novavax-jabs-UK-bought-five-months-ago.html
Meanwhile the UK is set to rocket ahead with the 90% effective Novavax vaccine that UK has 60 million doses of ordered.
This is also being made in the UK, this time by an American company, requires 1 dose and is more effective against the new variants in the UK and around the world.

 

Astrazeneca has release the contract [you can find it also on EU site].
There is a matter of a conditional verb ...

My opinion is that the EU Commission has waiting for too long before of transforming intentions into real orders [not only with Astrazeneca]. This is not related to the structure of the Union, but to the decisions of the Commission. I'd say that this Commission is not passing the first important exam. It happens ...

 

Well, whatever the reason may be, Brexit has made Britain more efficient now and lead in Europe.

 

No, you're out of Europe. You're doing well on yourself about this.
But you're not leading Europe at all ... you have left Europe.

 

Anyway, as an aside note, UK hasn't been able to manage the pandemic in a good way ... I remember PM Johnson saying that he expected 70,000 deaths in UK ... now in UK you are counting more than 104,000 deaths.

Not only this, if we take a general look at the development of the pandemic [data from Hopkins site https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6]

Country Population Cases %
1. Czechia 10554000 972.642 9,216%
2. US 329065000 25.863.057 7,860%
3. Israel 8519000 633.991 7,442%
4. Portugal 10226000 698.593 6,832%
5. Belgium 11539000 702.437 6,088%
6. Switzerland 8591000 521.320 6,068%
7. Spain 46737000 2.743.119 5,869%
8. Netherlands 17097000 984.057 5,756%
9. Sweden 10036000 566.957 5,649%
10. Serbia 7001000 392.354 5,604%
11. UK 67530000 3.783.593 5,603%
12. France 65130000 3.212.613 4,933%
13. Austria 8955000 411.730 4,598%
14. Slovakia 5458000 246.008 4,507%
15. Argentina 43432000 1.905.524 4,387%
16. Lebenon 6849000 296.282 4,326%
17. Brazil 211049000 9.058.687 4,292%
18. Italy 60100000 2.529.070 4,208%
19. Colombia 49892000 2.067.575 4,144%
20. Ireland 4882000 193.892 3,972%

UK has done well worse than Ireland. And well worse than Brazil!
In a few words ... UK needs vaccines, all the vaccines it's able to find.

So, I repeat, I'm ok about this. When a country is in desperate conditions .. it deserves the priority.

 

UK's still in Europe, as is Norway and the EU.
But UK's leading in Europe.

 

We are proposing the creation of a furhter continent: the British Continent ...
So that, finally, you will leave Europe for real!

Jokes aside, geographically Great Britain is on the European shelf, so you are in Europe.
But, frankly speaking, if you think to lead Europe after leaving EU ... I don't want to disappoint you, but you're going to walk alone [despite what you sing in your stadiums ...].

P.S. Allow me to be poetic ... [you know Italians]: we will never walk together again.

 

↑
Well, whatever the reason may be, Brexit has made Britain more efficient now and lead in Europe.

No, you're out of Europe. You're doing well on yourself about this.
But you're not leading Europe at all ... you have left Europe.

Are you discussing geographically, culturally or mentally?
But in any case the UK is not leading in anything except a lot of self congratulation and misunderstanding, red tape and deception.
It really does not know where it is as a "united kingdom" right now with both Scotland and Northern Ireland profoundly unhappy with the result of Brexit, and one or both may well leave the "union". England is firefighting and tries to look cheerful but is having a sort of identity crisis which I think will take a long time to resolve. It has voted itself out of both "control" as in colonial and is searching around for a new gang. Right now it is defiantly alone.