EURACTIV understands that the question of how to classify and price COVID vaccines donated by rich countries may artificially increase the EU’s development assistance figures by billions of euros.
In the final year of the pandemic, inequality in access to COVID vaccines has been one of the most controversial topics in Europe and around the world.
In June, donor countries agreed to report their COVID-19 vaccine donations as official development assistance starting in 2020.
At the next meeting of the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Development Assistance Committee (DAC) in January 2022, they will agree on the prices of these vaccines.
The latest proposal being considered by donor countries shows that the price of each vaccine is US$6.72, more than double the previous US$3 proposal. According to the commitments made by the EU and its member states, although no additional funds have been provided, the EU’s official development assistance (ODA) can increase by up to 5 billion euros in the next two years.
Last year, the DAC debate on what can be classified as aid focused on expenditures on immigration control, loans, and military support.
Nerea Craviotto, senior policy and advocacy officer of the European Debt and Development Network, said: “The wealthy countries in the north of the world ordered a large number of COVID-19 vaccines during the development period, and the stock is now approaching the expiration date.” Father of Europe).
She added: “These vaccines have never been purchased for development purposes, and they should not be called that.”
“We have not seen DAC publish any ODA eligibility criteria for dose sharing. Without common principles and safeguards, donors may use vaccine redistribution to exaggerate their official development assistance contributions, and the vaccine itself may never reach them. In the hands of those who intend to benefit, this is a huge risk.”
The OECD DAC members, including 19 EU member states, are expected to reach a final agreement on pricing and classification in December. This issue will be included on the agenda at the three-day meeting of the DAC Development Financial Statistics Working Group, which will begin on November 22.
Donations to the COVAX initiative, which aims to act as an international coordinator for vaccine supply, are also classified as official assistance.
The European Union is the second largest donor of COVAX after the United States. However, COVAX is facing difficulties in its own supply chain and has been working hard to provide large quantities of vaccines to developing countries.
Critics point out that the “vaccine nationalism” of wealthy Western countries and the European Union has created a situation where developing countries cannot buy their own vaccine supplies. Counting COVID doses as official development assistance will effectively reward this behavior.
The European Union, the United Kingdom, and Japan have also taken the lead against a campaign initiated by India and South Africa to temporarily abandon the protection of intellectual property rights for COVID vaccines and allow them and developing countries to produce their own generic vaccines.
It is expected that a decision on patent exemption activities will be made at a World Trade Organization meeting later this month.
Sources close to the negotiations told EURACTIV that DAC members are divided on the price of each vaccine. Others hope that the pricing will differentiate between the more expensive Moderna and Pfizer vaccines and the AstraZeneca dosage.
Italy and Belgium are among the countries that are satisfied with the price, while Sweden is one of the countries that want the price to be consistent with the market price. EURACTIV understands that the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland have also expressed reservations about the price plan.
Although the international community supports the World Health Organization’s goal of vaccinating 70% of the world’s population by April next year, only 261 million doses of the 1.8 billion doses promised by rich countries have reached low-income countries, equivalent to 14%. . The EU has pledged to donate 500 million jabs.
[Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic]
