Filenews 26 February 2021 - by Marilena Panagi
Cyprus' choice was to put all its eggs in AstraZeneca's basket. Each Member State, the head of the European delegation in Cyprus, Ierotheos Papadopoulos, made his own choices. Cyprus, he explained, "chose to get more vaccines from AstraZeneca. Not all countries have taken the same amount from the same companies. Each country made its own choices."
Mr Papadopoulos made this position when, during yesterday's meeting of the House Health Committee, which was discussing vaccine and vaccination issues for coronavirus in general, He was asked by Members to explain why Malta, despite being a country with a smaller population than Cyprus, has already received larger quantities of vaccines.
Malta, he said, "or other countries may have chosen larger quantities than the two companies whose vaccines were licensed first", and added: "There was an over-optimism from AstraZeneca, perhaps the company itself overestimated its potential, but, also in the EU, we distributed the 'basket' to six companies, even though we thought that this company, given the circumstances of the time , he would come first." "We need to make it clear that at the time the agreements were being made, we were actually pre-buying something that did not exist, so at that time we could not know which of the vaccines would get first authorisation from the European Medicines Agency," said the head of the European delegation.
Following Mr Papadopoulos' replies, the pressure from MePs, who referred to the fact that Cyprus has committed the largest quantities of vaccines from this company, "leaving the other companies much further behind", turned to the two representatives of the Ministry of Health with the Deputy Director of Pharmaceutical Services Elena Panagiotopoulou explaining that "depending on the agreements that the competent European Commission was closing , Cyprus submitted its requests. So the choice was made according to the order in which the agreements were reached and that is clear." AstraZeneca "was the company with which a deal was first made and then followed by the other companies," he said.
Intense pressure from Members, both to the head of the European delegation and to the representatives of the Ministry of Health and to the issue of the import into Cyprus of vaccines from third countries, making particular reference to the Russian vaccine "Sputnik". Indeed, some MePs pointed out that 'other countries, such as Hungary, have made progress on their own and regardless of the EU's common procedures for introducing this vaccine'. They also indicated that "Cyprus could, by following procedures that allow it to make similar moves in order to speed up the vaccination process of the Cypriot population".
Ierotheos Papadopoulos spoke of "misinformation and propaganda", saying that the manufacturer has not yet applied for authorisation of its vaccine to the European Medicines Agency (EMA)" and added: "The company has submitted a request to the scientific committee but this committee is not the appropriate body to apply for authorisation. The authorities are well aware of where to make the application."
At the same time, he said, "in order to license a vaccine, the EMA must also be able to do checks on the factories that manufacture it." On the other hand, he continued, "there are some questions that need to be answered. Do they have vaccines to cover us as an EU since they haven't had time to vaccinate their own population?"
In this case, he stressed, "there is also a geopolitical game around vaccines, it seems." As an EU, "from the beginning we said that all 27 of us would move together. It is obvious that if each country starts making its own deals, this strategy will not work. We have fought from the beginning, a battle that is in the interests of small countries such as Cyprus, Malta, Greece. If each country starts and makes bilateral agreements it will not help. This is not a Union, a union is for all of us to move forward for the good of all of us."
For her part, the Deputy Director of Pharmaceutical Services referred, inter alia, to the legislation "On Medicines and Human Use", which, as she said, clearly states that "no medicinal product may be marketed in the Republic of Cyprus, unless it is authorised either by the Medicines Council or by the EU, with a positive opinion of the European Medicines Agency". The medicines, he continued, "belong to the category of advanced technology and these vaccines belong to the category of advanced technology, are licensed and evaluated only by the European Medicines Agency. Therefore, no Member State alone carries out evaluations of these medicinal products.
Specifically for the "Sputnik" vaccine, he said that "the company had expressed an intention to be licensed by THE EMA. The Commission has studied this, and is at the stage where it will have inspectors go to inspect the manufacturers in order to proceed with the process." Right now, he said, "we are on a platform in which all states register side effects that are recorded during vaccination. If a vaccine is not licensed by the European Medicines Agency, we will not have this information."
'It is not established that the deaths were the result of vaccination'
During the sitting, MePs spoke of information that reaches out to them concerning the elderly and especially the elderly in Cyprus, "who were vaccinated and then died, without anyone investigating it". Indeed, as they pointed out, 'we need to know if in the end we are putting some people at risk'.
The deputy director of pharmaceutical services, was immediate, "no official report has been made of the death of a person who was vaccinated and subsequently passed away." Moreover, he said, "there is no mention from other countries either that any death has been associated with the vaccination of the three licensed vaccines, namely BioNTech-Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca.
For his part, the head of the EU delegation in Cyprus stressed that "it is not right to say that one person was vaccinated one night and died the next. At European level and after vaccination of millions of people, no deaths associated with vaccination have been recorded."
