EU President Ursula Von Der Leyen Receives Letter From Five Nations About Vaccine Distribution

EU PRESIDENT Ursula Von Der Leyen Receives Letter From Five Nations Demanding A Meeting About Vaccine Distribution

The heads of five EU member states have written an official letter – which was published by Austrian media – to the European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, and to Charles Michel, the European Council President, demanding talks on the distribution of coronavirus vaccines after Austria complained it was not “fair”.

The letter was written by the leaders of Austria, Latvia, Slovenia, Bulgaria, and the Czech Republic, in which they called for a summit to be held to discuss the distribution of the vaccines throughout the bloc, with Brussels already under fire for the slow rollout.

Sebastian Kurz, the Austrian Chancellor, in a Twitter post today, Saturday 13, said, “In recent days … we have discovered that … deliveries of vaccine doses by pharma companies to individual EU member states are not being implemented on an equal basis following the pro-rata population key”.

He continued, “We, therefore, call on you, Charles, to hold a discussion on this important matter among leaders as soon as possible”, and apparently, an EU official confirmed that Mr Michel was already planning a summit for March 25 and 26, saying, “Covid coordination will again be addressed by the 27 members during that meeting”, but without mentioning if the distribution of vaccines was on the agenda.

On Friday, My Kurtz had tweeted, “The EU heads of state and government have already agreed on a fair distribution of the vaccine in the summer of 2020. However, the last few weeks have shown that deliveries are currently not being made according to population keys and that this is set to intensify in the coming months”.

Adding, “This approach clearly contradicts the political goal of the EU – the equal distribution of vaccine doses to all member states. If the distribution were to continue in this way, it would result in significant unequal treatment – which we must prevent. All 450 million Europeans must be given the chance to return to normality by the summer”.

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Written by

Chris King

Originally from Wales, Chris spent years on the Costa del Sol before moving to the Algarve where he is a web reporter for The Euro Weekly News covering international and Spanish national news. Got a news story you want to share? Then get in touch at editorial@euroweeklynews.com

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