Fifteen Member States Sign Agreements for Supply of Pandemic Influenza Vaccines under Umbrella of Joint Procurement Agreement
- 29/03/2019
- News
On 28 March 2019 the European Commission announced that 15 EU Member States and the Commission signed framework contracts with the pharmaceutical firm Seqirus for the supply of pandemic influenza vaccines to 30 contracting authorities in these Member States in the event of an influenza pandemic (https://ec.europa.eu/health/sites/health/files/preparedness_response/docs/ev_20190328_memo_en.pdf). The agreements will run for at least 4 years and are subject to a possible extension of 2 more years.
Under the agreements, Seqirus will not only supply vaccines but will also reserve part of its weekly manufacturing capacity and will be paid in return an annual preparedness fee.
The agreements were concluded under the Joint Procurement Agreement (“JPA”), a framework established on the basis of Article 5 of Decision 1082/2013/EU tackling serious cross-border threats to health. A similar set of agreements was entered into in 2016 to organise the joint procurement of botulinum anti-toxin. A further series of agreements to expand the vaccine coverage is under preparation. Additional joint procurement procedures for diphtheria anti-toxin, tuberculin and Bacillus Calmette–Guérin (“BCG”) vaccines, and personal protective equipment are under consideration.
The JPA was conceived of to improve the state of preparedness of Member States for serious cross-border threats to health, ensure equal treatment of patients affected and increase the buying power of Member States when anticipating emergency situations.
