Germany has received offers of up to 100 million doses of vaccines against Covid-19 in recent weeks from alleged intermediaries of pharmaceutical companies, which confirms the suspicion of the existence of a fraudulent market for vaccines, given the shortage of vials in the world and the rush to get them. The information advanced by the German newspaper ‘Bild’ has been confirmed today by the Ministry of Health through a spokesman, according to which “the federal government has received offers of vaccines of different seriousness from private intermediaries. All were rejected. The global shortage of vaccines against Covid-19 and the need to accelerate the inoculation of citizens to stop the pandemic has made a black market flourish that has already been detected in Italy, the Czech Republic, and Germany.
According to information from the daily ‘Bild’ confirmed by the German Ministry of Health, the federal government has received offers of vaccines of different seriousness from private intermediaries. They were all rejected. The offers received from channels other than those used by the European Commission, which negotiates directly with manufacturers, referred to 100 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine. The market value of these doses, which could both be saltwater in small bottles, and come from theft in factories or diversions in the distribution chain would be around 3,000 million euros. The German case has not been the only one detected on European soil, hence the concern expressed by the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, the week passes at a press conference. Von der Leyen did not give names, but said he had “heard of cases of dose offers being made” and that vaccine fraud is increasing.
The president of the EC responded to an Italian journalist’s question about information that appeared in the newspaper ‘La Stampa’, according to which a Brazilian merchant had offered a special commissioner for Covid-19, Domenico Arcuri, and the region from Lombardy a million doses. To this were added the 27 million doses that two intermediaries of pharmaceutical companies offered to the authorities of the Veneto region. And something similar has also happened in the Czech Republic and two other EU countries not mentioned by Prime Minister Andrej Babis. In a parliamentary speech last week, the Czech leader declared that he had received offers to sign agreements for the supply of vaccines outside of the community agreement. While AstraZeneza refuses to distribute 80 million doses to the EU, we have received not only me, but three other prime ministers in Europe offers to receive doses of this vaccine immediately, said Bubis. The proposal, in this case, came from an intermediary in Dubai. Alarms sounded in Brussels, which proceeded to a round of questions among the Twenty-seven and other allies with alarming results. In total, up to 400 million doses had been offered through irregular channels.
The matter has been put in the hands of the EU anti-fraud office -Olaf- and Europol, while the manufacturers of the vaccines AstraZeneca and Biontec / Pzifer have denied without nuances to be supplying doses to the private market and recalled that “while it lasts the pandemic, only agreements have been and will be signed with governments. “Buying vaccines on the black market carries a huge risk, even if they are genuine. “There is no guarantee that the distribution chain is respected and that is essential for vaccines as complex as those based on mRNA and the vaccine consists of injecting a biologically active substance. This is a matter of enormous responsibility,” insisted Von der They read. And he warned that “whoever buys vaccines on the black market will assume full responsibility if something happens”
