It is increasingly clear that the EU vaccine supply problems have bottomed out and that the news will be considerably better going forward. This shifts the "vaccine delivery problem" firmly on to the EU MS, whose capacity to quickly scale up roll outs may be severely tested. 1/n

The recent good news are numerous: Today an additional delivery 200mn @BioNTech_Group/@Pfizer vaccines to the EU, incl. crucially 75mn in Q2 was announced. 2/n https://t.co/LD3EnwHYLI
Yesterday @EMA_News received the application for approval of the single-jab J&J/Jannsen vaccine, expected to come during the month of March. 3/n https://t.co/mn4usnpfFN
Several EU MS have now announced updated vaccine rollout plans including expected deliveries of still-to-be-approved vaccines. I discussed the Norwegian scenarios from @Folkehelseinst showing how NO continues to plan for full 100% vaccination of 16y+ 4/n https://t.co/96wGCOo9gC
by July. Earlier this week, the DK authorities updated their planned vaccine rollout and brought the expected 100% vacc'ing of 16y+ pop completion FORWARD by a week or so to LATE JUNE 2021. The expected future vacc deliveries to DK implies that 5/n https://t.co/WMj76L5AhJ
they (roughly like NO with new vaccs) expect to receive a # of vacc = the equivalent of 160+% of 16y+ population by June 2021. With a lot of these J&J/Jannsen single jab vaccines, full vaccination (or at least the offer given to all) is expected by late June 2021. This plan 6/n
BTW is considerably faster for full completion than the schedule discussed by UK Vaccine Taskforce's Clive Dix recently (Aug/Sep or though sooner if needed). The obvious question is why - given population weighted vacc deliveries in the EU is it not 7/n https://t.co/RLMPFvc81K
the ambition of ALL EU MS to - like scheduled by NO and DK - finish vaccine rollout BEFORE the summer? The financial costs are irrelevant, given the economic gains from earlier reopening and the human health benefits likely even larger from an "near normal summer". What is 8/n
preventing say @jensspahn or @olivierveran (insert any MS health minister) of from adopting the same level of vaccine rollout ambition in GE or FR? Lack of government capacity? Inability to mobilize volunteers? I honestly cannot think of any good excuse for not doing so now? 9/n
DK gov over the WE said they wanted to be sure up to 7% of pop could be vacc'ed a DAY and surely it should be the role of the @EU_Commission to ensure "best practices" are disseminated quickly throughout the EU? EU Vaccine pessimism must not prevail. END https://t.co/ezkVIYXggR
@MESandbu
@GuntramWolff
@alanbeattie
@adam_tooze
@duncanrobinson
@Mij_Europe
@SonyKapoor
@john_lichfield
@tom_nuttall
@spignal
@RobinWigg
@YanniKouts
@Sam1Fleming
@hallbenjamin
@HankeVela
@StevenErlanger
@nchrysoloras
@StephenFidler1
@gideonrachman
@Simon_Nixon
@katka_cseh
Happy to report that Sweden has now also published updated vaccine delivery schedules indicating it also finish vaccinating 100% by June. Why not all of the EU? https://t.co/jTnh60bJHe

More from Society

I've seen many news articles cite that "the UK variant could be the dominant strain by March". This is emphasized by @CDCDirector.

While this will likely to be the case, this should not be an automatic cause for concern. Cases could still remain contained.

Here's how: 🧵

One of @CDCgov's own models has tracked the true decline in cases quite accurately thus far.

Their projection shows that the B.1.1.7 variant will become the dominant variant in March. But interestingly... there's no fourth wave. Cases simply level out:

https://t.co/tDce0MwO61


Just because a variant becomes the dominant strain does not automatically mean we will see a repeat of Fall 2020.

Let's look at UK and South Africa, where cases have been falling for the past month, in unison with the US (albeit with tougher restrictions):


Furthermore, the claim that the "variant is doubling every 10 days" is false. It's the *proportion of the variant* that is doubling every 10 days.

If overall prevalence drops during the studied time period, the true doubling time of the variant is actually much longer 10 days.

Simple example:

Day 0: 10 variant / 100 cases -> 10% variant
Day 10: 15 variant / 75 cases -> 20% variant
Day 20: 20 variant / 50 cases -> 40% variant

1) Proportion of variant doubles every 10 days
2) Doubling time of variant is actually 20 days
3) Total cases still drop by 50%

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