European Health Ministers supported the European Commission's idea of focusing jointly on a series of promising vaccines by providing financial support for developing the vaccines in exchange for rapid access to any that prove effective. This was the outcome of their videoconference meeting on Friday 12 June.
Terms and conditions still under discussion
Note that, on Wednesday 17 June, the Commission is planning to present an EU strategy for developing a vaccine against Covid-19 based on advance purchase agreements (see EUROPE 12503/2). First, however, the Commission used the videoconference to sound out the health ministers on their level of interest.
Following the discussion in closed session, Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides stated that “a number of points were raised and I would say there was overwhelming support for this initiative from the Commission”. In response to a question from EUROPE about whether some Member States had indicated that they did not intend to participate in the scheme, she replied: “As far as I know, no Member States have said they won’t be joining this initiative. Of course, they need to see how it develops and we will discuss a lot of the observations they have made with them”.
She believes that the coalition formed by France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands should not be seen as a competitor for the Commission's future strategy. “We are all on the same side”, she said, and went on to state that the two initiatives should eventually merge into one for the common good (see EUROPE 12499/5).
EU4Health programme raises subsidiarity concerns
The informal videoconference also enabled the EU27 to exchange views on the EU4Health programme that the Commission is proposing be set up after 2020 to learn lessons from the pandemic (see EUROPE 12495/7).
During the round table, which was held in public, several Member States expressed their concern that the EU would encroach on their areas of responsibility. The Czech Republic called for Member States to adopt an annual work programme and clear rules on co-financing and to put clear performance indicators in place. The Netherlands, which believes that these discussions cannot be separated from the talks on the EU budget 2021-2027, stressed that the role of Member States cannot be reduced to simply implementing the programme.
Lastly, Germany, which will hold the rotating Presidency of the EU Council from 1 July 2020, called for the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control to be provided with a health taskforce and for a European network of patient safety specialists to be set up and funded.
Germany is one of the co-signatories - along with Belgium, Denmark, Spain, France and Poland - of a letter to the Commission calling for greater European cooperation in health matters, including research, data sharing, and strategic stockpiling.
To read the letter, go to: https://bit.ly/3fukbS3 (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)