We now know why US cannot share its COVID19 vaccines with the world - TRUMP

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

Tweet text:
Eric Feigl-Ding
@DrEricDing
📍NEW—We now know why US cannot share its #COVID19 vaccines with the world—Trump WH had forced legal contracts that blocks US doses by Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca, J&J from being donated. Hence 🇨🇦&🇲🇽 only got “loans”, despite >45 mil dose US surplus. 🧵
https://vanityfair.com/news/2021/04/why-the-us-still-cant-donate-covid-19-vaccines-to-countries-in-need…
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https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/04/why-the-us-still-cant-donate-covid-19-vaccines-to-countries-in-need


On the morning of March 31, roughly 25 Biden administration officials gathered at the White House, double-masked, for a meeting called on short notice by a member of the National Security Council. They were there, they believed, to debate how best to broaden the federal government’s COVID-19 response beyond U.S. borders, and reclaim America’s traditional role as the world’s public health leader.

The challenges they planned to address were daunting. The Trump administration had poisoned relations with the rest of the world, first severing ties with the World Health Organization and then politicizing the pandemic, referring to COVID-19 as the Wuhan virus and even “kung flu.” Into the vacuum rushed Russia and China, who began currying favor around the world by distributing their own vaccines—of possibly dubious quality.

Inside the U.S., all eyes have been focused on the chaotic rollout of vaccinations. But if current trends continue, it will be months if not weeks before every adult who wants a shot is able to get one. Very soon, the U.S. will be in possession of a vast COVID vaccine surplus. And that, global-health experts within the government agree, could quickly turn into a P.R. nightmare. “Can you imagine the condemnation of the world if America has vaccines sitting on warehouse shelves expiring with the rest of the world dying?” said one senior government official with knowledge of the meeting.

Unfortunately, sending doses overseas is no simple matter. To even begin planning in earnest how to do so, an essential document entitled The Framework for International Access needed to be greenlit. That was a goal of several officials in attendance at the meeting at the White House last Wednesday.

*snip*

[iemitsu]

1. Trump is a monster.

[LudwigPastorius]

2. Renegotiate.

Every contract can be modified...if the parties involved agree.

[Hortensis]

17. Right. All parties involved will fix it. There's still a big world to save,

and we're still part of it.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

3. Why would you even order 45M more doses that you need in the first place?

I kinda doubt we're sitting on 45M more doses RIGHT NOW than there are people who need them, I would assume that's just the size of the eventual order.

So once we have everyone done, make the corporations look like assholes if they MAKE us take doses that the rest of the world needs, and then insist his contract is upheld and that we don't share them.

Assuming we don't already have this huge surplus, we should at least be able to have them never actually brought here in the first place, but rather given to needy countries directly, while we cover the cost.

[meadowlander]

5. Lots of governments hedged their bets because they didn't know which versions

were going to get approval. They pre-ordered as many doses as they could get across the three or four different versions of the vaccine that were likely to get through. Sensible countries were then planning to donate the surplus to countries that missed out.

I agree that the corporations will likely allow renegotiation of thee contracts at least with respect to whether the surplus can be donated. It's not like they're going to get a better price from Tuvalu directly than they got from the US who pre-ordered in a frenzy and overpaid and then wants to donate to Tuvalu.

[Grasswire2]

8. If we have 45 m extra doses, why is it that only 50% of seniors in my county have gotten appts?

People are scrambling to get appointments. It's a giant mess. As of next week, everyone in the state will be eligible, yet only 50 percent of this metro suburban county's seniors have been able to get appointments. I've been trying for months.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

9. Yeah, I don't think we're 'sitting on' that much, I think that's just the order size is my bet (nt)

[Kaleva]

14. Probably depends on where you live and how it's managed locally or statewide

I live in rural Upper Michigan, am 62, and have had both my shots already. My wife is 52 and will be getting her first shot this Thursday.

[Initech]

4. Guess that's the art of the deal?

[moonscape]

6. As someone else said, contracts can be

renegotiated. Biden also is responsible for the boosted production isn’t he? I thought the pror admin didn’t order that many.

Pfizer wasn’t part of Operation Warp Speed except as an advance order, i.e. didn’t accept funds for development, so it would be odd to have the same contracts, no?

[PortTack]

11. President Biden lovingly called a wily old fox will find a way around it..no doubt

[Blue Owl]

7. Donald tRump is a big fat piece of fucking shit

[Hugh_Lebowski]

10. The corporations are kinda assholes too in this unless they let us share once everyone here is shot

[North Shore Chicago]

13. You crack me up.

[Cha]

12. Fuckers, of course! Rt TY

[Johonny]

15. By the end of the summer

I imagine Biden will wave that and start shipping our vaccine everywhere.

Although we will have competition from China.

[lame54]

16. Operation Warped Mind

[dalton99a]

18. Kick

[PatSeg]

19. What a dick!

So mean and cruel.

[peggysue2]

20. Once again, Trump poisoned the well

Hopefully, Biden's team will find a way around the contractural restriction bc the OP is on the mark. If the US cannot disperse our over-supply of Covid vaccination materials to the rest of the world, it will not only stain our already rumpled reputation but increase the longevity of the virus replicating around the globe. That means more variants and more suffering. We need only look at Brazil, the virus gone wild and spilling across borders, to understand how global vaccinations are integral to defeating this scourge.

On a positive note, I listened to a podcast the other day about a group of doctors (in Texas, no less) working feverishly on a less expensive but effective People's Vaccine, developed specifically for a global vaccination effort.

There are many people of goodwill out there working their butts off to put this virus down. In a pandemic, the health of the world ultimately effects Americans. It's something Trump and his minions fail to understand.

[muriel_volestrangler]

21. It appears it's as much the manufacturers' fault, if not more

From the Vanity Fair article:

In a statement to Vanity Fair, a Defense Department spokesperson acknowledged the contract restrictions, saying: “DoD did attempt to negotiate terms that would allow the use of vaccine doses outside the U.S., but in some cases, the vaccine manufacturers refused.” Given the imperative to produce 300 million doses for the American public, said the spokesperson, Operation Warp Speed officials agreed that it was “more important to contract with the vaccine manufacturers for doses that could be used” by U.S. citizens “than walk away from the negotiations based on this single term.”

Do you get the feeling the makers want to sell the excess at a profit they can now renegotiate (with the proof of effectiveness now evident, rather than hoped-for), rather than at the price the US government many months ago?