The Oxford Astra Zeneca (AZ) Advance Purchasing Agreement (APA)

Putting the MHRA’s actions into more context.

Thanks again to the Italian state broadcaster RAI and their Report team for posting online the unredacted versions of the Advance Purchasing Agreement (APA) for the three COVID-19 vaccines. 

The APAs for Covid vaccines were signed, sealed and delivered in 2020 amid the panic by the EU Commission on behalf of member states which wished to enter into the agreement (or Participating Member States in EU speak)—effectively booking a load of vaccines before their market authorisation (MA). Each State had a 5-day bug-out period if they did not want to sign on or change their minds. But if you sign on and stay in, you are obliged to buy the stuff.

Remember that at the time, the UK was still in the EU for pharmaceutical approval purposes. The UKHSA “lent on” EMA and its centralised procedure for granting Market Authorisation (MA) for vaccines by the EMA.

This time we look at the arrangements for the Oxford AZ product. The APA for the Oxford AZ vaccine signed by the European Commission and the man…