BRUSSELS – The battle over vaccines between the UK and the European Union intensified on Wednesday, highlighting the rapidly deteriorating relations already delayed by disputes over the agreement that reinforced the UK’s separation from the bloc.
The final blow to once-close relations between major US allies came when the EU announced it was considering giving member states more power to block exports of Covid-19 vaccines, of which the UK was the largest non-EU recipient.
The UK vaccination campaign has yielded at least one injection in nearly half of the country’s adults, in contrast to the EU’s hitherto faltering rollout.
Britain left the bloc on January 31 last year and began a new economic relationship early this year based on a last-minute trade deal that established a corporate trade relationship.
At the time, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the agreement was “a solution to the old, tired, tormented issue of Britain’s political relations with Europe, which has disrupted our post-war history.” He said the UK would be “the best friend and ally the EU could have”.
So far it has not worked out like this.
The relationship “is very dysfunctional and the channels that are open to resolve things have been broken,” said Mujtaba Rahman, general manager of the Eurasia Group, a consulting firm.
Actions by both the UK and the EU have shaken confidence in part of the divorce treaty aimed at avoiding a border on the island of Ireland after Brexit. Britain has refused to grant full diplomatic status to the EU’s envoy in London, thus excluding the British ambassador in Brussels from the meetings. Trade between the UK and European countries, meanwhile, has fallen dramatically due to the pandemic and new trade barriers introduced for the first time in nearly five decades this year.
The pandemic has fueled the teething troubles expected in this new relationship. Britain has approved and rolled out its vaccines faster than the European countries, which had left the EU to handle tenders on their behalf. The UK was also quick to win contracts for the supply of vaccines.
Europe’s Covid-19 Battle
Some top European politicians and health regulators questioned whether a vaccine developed and rolled out by AstraZeneca PLC and the University of Oxford in the UK was effective in the elderly. Data has since confirmed it to be so. Following a shortage in the supply of AstraZeneca vaccines to the EU, several European governments have stopped using the vaccine for fear it could cause blood clots.
Pro-Brexit campaigners pointed to the EU’s vaccine problem as an example of why Britain was right about leaving the bloc.
“This week we saw what happens when you marry an anti-science, anti-entrepreneur and anti-technology culture in Brussels with its hideous bureaucracy in its insane decisions about AstraZeneca vaccine warnings,” said Dominic Cummings, a former chef. of staff for Mr Johnson, said Wednesday.
As highly transmissible coronavirus variants fly around the world, scientists are rushing to understand why these new versions of the virus are spreading faster and what this could mean for vaccination efforts. New research says the key may be the spike protein, which gives the coronavirus its unmistakable shape. Illustration: Nick Collingwood / WSJ
The EU introduced a mechanism at the end of January that would allow member states to prevent vaccine doses from being exported outside the bloc. Only one export batch has been shut down since then.
The UK government has not banned the export of vaccines. But under the contracts it has signed with vaccine suppliers, it has secured a first-come, first-served basis, which has bolstered its vaccination campaign. Last week, the UK convened a senior EU diplomat in response to allegations made by European Council President Charles Michel that Britain had an “outright export ban”.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday that the EU could tighten its export ban to stop sending vaccines to countries that did not sell vaccines to the bloc and were at the forefront of vaccination campaigns. As Britain is by far the largest recipient of vaccinations – with 10 million doses sold to the UK since the end of January – Ms. von der Leyen said Britain was a country it wanted to see reciprocity from.
The EU has exported 40 million doses of vaccine since January, making the bloc the largest exporter of vaccines in the world, despite the difficulties of purchasing and delivering vaccines.
The tensions over vaccines come against the background of friction between London and Brussels over the implementation of the Brexit Agreement – and in particular the so-called Northern Ireland Protocol, a complicated arrangement that leaves the Northern Ireland region of the UK an open border can maintain with the Republic of Ireland, which is an EU member. The deal stipulates that the UK must carry out customs controls on products going from the UK mainland to Northern Ireland to ensure they meet EU standards.
Britain has said it would unilaterally postpone implementation of the controls, which would begin next month. On Monday, the EU executive said it was taking legal action against that decision. The move could result in sanctions being imposed by the bloc’s highest court and, once the post-Brexit trade deal is fully ratified, retaliatory measures against the UK.
British officials believe the EU is trying to protect its internal market at the risk of undermining the peace process in Ireland. Earlier this year, the EU commission published a plan to ban the export of vaccines to Northern Ireland. The decision was never implemented, but it reinforced opposition among pro-British unionists to the Brexit deal in Northern Ireland.
The Biden government has urged Brussels and London to enter Ireland cautiously. “We continue to encourage both the European Union and the UK Government to prioritize pragmatic solutions to protect and promote the hard-won peace in Northern Ireland,” said White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki.
Senior British government officials such as David Frost, who negotiated the Brexit deal and now heads the government’s EU strategy, have also accused the EU of harboring ill will towards Britain over his departure.
The battle for the diplomatic status of the EU ambassador in London has caused communications between top officials in Brussels and the UK to dry up, people on both sides said.
Meanwhile, with new trade barriers emerging this year, there has been a sharp drop in trade between the two sides, although it is not clear how much of this is related to the pandemic and stockpiling by importers and exporters last year. Data from the UK shows that exports of British goods to the EU fell 41% in January from the previous month, and imports by 56% from a year earlier.
—Jason Douglas in London contributed to this article.
Write to Max Colchester at [email protected] and Laurence Norman at [email protected]
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