Francisco Guerreiro: 'Without EU help, Portugal would have trouble obtaining vaccines for everyone'
Lisbon, 5 January 2021 - MEP Francisco Guerreiro wants to know how much the European Commission (EC) invested in each Member State and how much Portugal saved in the acquisition of vaccines against Covid-19.
In his question for written answer to the EC, Francisco Guerreiro asks if “the Commission can provide a country-by-country breakdown of expenses covered by the EU, and not charged to individual Member States, in procuring the vaccines?”.
“Being a part of the European Union (EU) is essential for any country to face situations like this, because the pandemic brought about a health, social and economic crisis. It would have been truly complicated for any country to purchase vaccines against Covid-19 for all its inhabitants. Without EU financial help, Portugal would have trouble obtaining vaccines for everyone in a timely manner”, says the MEP.
The European Commission has responded swiftly to the global pandemic by signing contracts to order hundreds of millions of doses of various vaccines with a view to protecting all citizens of EU Member States, allocated proportionately to their populations.
To date, contracts have been signed to procure vaccines from six pharmaceutical companies: Pfizer/BioNTech; AstraZeneca/Oxford; Johnson & Johnson; Sanofi-GSK; Moderna and CureVac. A possible agreement with Novavax is also in the pipeline.
Guerreiro wants to avoid misleading use of the term “natural” on food products
Wednesday, 10 February 2021
Under the initiative of MEP Francisco Guerreiro (Greens/EFA), MEPs want to avoid the misleading use of the term “natural” on food products and ask the European Commission to provide a clear definition of “natural” in the European Union’s food legislation.READ MORE