Romania will receive approximately 8 million doses of the vaccine against COVID only under the 2022 contract with Pfizer, while 19 million doses are provided for our country in the 2023 contract, Health Minister Alexandru Rafila said on Monday in response to questions. on Bulgaria’s decision to refuse additional purchases of doses provided for by the EU contract concluded in 2021.

Rafila said there will be a meeting of health ministers next week where the issue of the already contracted doses of the Covid vaccine will also be discussed, but it is about “some obligations established by the commercial contract”.

• “We have united all these efforts from the very beginning.
• If you remember, Romania, together with nine other European countries, did this many months ago, we informed the European Commission, we informed the vaccine manufacturers about this, and it seems absolutely normal to us that vaccines that cannot be used or that are even did not happen because there are many that are the subject of the contract to be fulfilled this year, 2023, with a large number of vaccine doses…
• A meeting of health ministers will be held next week. I hope that I will propose more specific elements, but one thing that we cannot fail to mention, because it always comes up both in discussions with the European Commission and in discussions with manufacturers, is that there are some obligations, established commercial contract,” the health minister said when asked about Bulgaria’s decision not to take any more doses of the COVID vaccine because it had destroyed a “huge amount”.

“We try to purchase as few vaccines as possible, but contractual obligations remain”

He insisted that Romania is trying to buy as few COVID vaccines as possible, but “contractual obligations remain”:

• “I don’t know what the Bulgarians can do in this regard, but we are trying to do it in a way that is respectful and saves state resources.
• We have done this since the beginning of the mandate, both when we sold 7.5 million doses of vaccine in early 2022, and later when we were held back from purchasing, we tried to purchase as few vaccines as possible, but the contractual obligations remain. even if there is no agreement between the European Commission, which signed these contracts for and on behalf of the Member States, of course with the consent of the States, because the Commission and the manufacturers in the end did nothing other than to apply these things with the consent of the States” .

He accused his predecessors of committing to purchase 39 million doses of the COVID vaccine for 2022 and 2023, and this “became a commitment for Romania.”

“It is unacceptable that vaccines are bought en masse and then destroyed”

Rafila claimed that he raises the issue with other states every time he goes to Brussels, trying to find “the best solution”:

• “(…) After all, Romania is a party to these contracts, not necessarily the Ministry of Health, and we must find a responsible solution together with the government to solve this problem, which is very serious and rejects my point of view, shadow and creates problems in general for vaccination programs, not necessarily against the COVID infection, but also for other vaccination programs, because it is unacceptable that products that are not used are bought in large quantities and subsequently destroyed.”

How much vaccine against COVID-19 would Romania receive?

• Asked how many more vaccines Romania will receive, the health minister said he did not want to “go into details.”

According to Rafila, approximately 8 million doses are yet to be received from the contract with Pfizer for 2022, and the contract for 2023 includes 19 million doses, of which our country has not yet received a single dose.

How many doses of the COVID vaccine did Romania destroy?

In January, Rafila told Euronews Romania that authorities had to destroy “a good few million doses” of expired COVID vaccines, which he estimated would cost “more than 100 million euros”:

• “The old vaccines, those purchased under the classical strain, have expired. There is no mention of running out of current stocks of vaccines that have just arrived.
• There are several million expired doses. They are not frozen anymore. It makes no sense to store them in special freezers if the expiration date has expired. Next will be the neutralization procedure, the procedure of unused biologics.
• Unfortunately, when contracts were made in Romania for the quantity of vaccine, they did not consider the possibility of their use and contracts were made even when, despite the evidence that it could not be used, it was done (.. .)
• These are large sums (according to destroyed vaccines – no). Now I can’t make an exact calculation. Certainly, they exceed 100 million euros.”

Bulgaria refuses to buy more COVID-19 vaccines and has asked to terminate its contract with Pfizer

Bulgaria is destroying a large number of expired anti-covid vaccines and has no intention of replenishing its stocks, the health minister said on Saturday, dpa reported.

• “At the moment, there are no more people to vaccinate the population,” Acting Minister of Health Asen Medzhdiev said in an interview with state television in Sofia.

Having already destroyed a “huge amount” of expired vaccines, Bulgaria is set to destroy another 2.8 million doses this year, the quoted official added.

He informed the European Commission that Bulgaria is in favor of terminating the contract with BioNTech/Pfizer, according to which his country is obliged to purchase vaccines against the coronavirus until 2025, Medzhdiev added.

This position is also supported by Poland, the Czech Republic and Lithuania, he noted.

Bulgaria has the lowest vaccination rate against COVID-19 in the EU. According to official figures, only 30 percent of the population of 6.5 million have basic immunization against the virus. In Bulgaria, since mid-November, there have been no mandatory measures to protect against the virus.

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