EU To Get Four Million Extra Pfizer Doses For ‘Hotspots'

The delivery will go to affected border regions within the bloc to help ensure or restore free movement of goods and people; Johnson rejects EU claims of vaccine blocking

The European Union will receive an extra four million BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine doses over the next two weeks to be deployed to COVID-19 “hotspots,” European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday.

The delivery - over and above already agreed on supplies from the vaccine-maker - will go to affected border regions within the bloc to “help ensure or restore free movement of goods and people,” she said in a statement.

The announcement came as the commission attempted to persuade at least six member states - including her home country Germany to lit virus-related border restrictions deemed by Brussels to be excessive.

It also follows a trip by the leaders of Austria and Denmark to Israel to form a vaccine-producing alliance that exemplified broad criticism of the lack of deliveries so far under the commission’s pre-purchasing scheme.

Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Wednesday rejected claims from European Council chief Charles Michel that the country had imposed a ban on Covid vaccine exports.

“Let me be clear: we have not blocked the export of a single COVID-19 vaccine or vaccine components,” he told parliament.