Pandemic: EU exported one billion corona vaccine doses

pandemic
EU exported one billion corona vaccine doses

Ursula von der Leyen: “We have always shared our vaccines fairly with the rest of the world.” Photo: Zhang Cheng / XinHua / dpa

© dpa-infocom GmbH

Ursula von der Leyen speaks of an “important milestone”. In the future, particularly endangered countries will be the focus of vaccine distribution.

The European Union has exported more than a billion corona vaccine doses to other countries around the world within ten months.

“We have reached an important milestone,” said Commissioner Ursula von der Leyen in Brussels. The vaccine has been delivered to more than 150 countries since December 2020 – including Japan, Turkey, Great Britain and Brazil. About 87 million cans were sent to low- and middle-income countries through the UN Covax initiative.

“We have always shared our vaccines fairly with the rest of the world,” emphasized von der Leyen. “We exported as much as we made available for the citizens of the EU.”

In view of the initially scarce vaccine and sometimes missing deliveries, the EU introduced export controls for corona vaccines at the beginning of February 2021 and tightened them in March. In certain cases, export can be prohibited. However, this almost never happened.

Von der Leyen has now confirmed that the EU will donate at least 500 million vaccine doses to particularly vulnerable countries in the coming months. “But other countries are also challenged.”

dpa

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