The European Fee downplayed the significance of the lacking messages, which have been despatched throughout Covid-19 vaccine negotiations
The European Fee stated it’s unable to find textual content messages despatched between its president, Ursula von der Leyen, and Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla throughout talks for an enormous vaccine deal final 12 months, however denied prior prices of “maladministration” from an EU watchdog.
The fee issued a letter on Wednesday stating that an expanded seek for the lacking messages had “not yielded any outcomes,” following months of dispute between the EU’s government physique and oversight officers. It argued that because of the “short-lived and ephemeral nature” of texts, they usually “don’t include vital info” and are due to this fact hardly ever saved.
Whereas von der Leyen revealed in an April 2021 interview that she and Bourla privately communicated for a number of weeks whereas negotiating a contract for practically 2 billion vaccine doses, a journalist’s public info request for the texts was later shot down, with the fee claiming it couldn’t discover the messages in query.
The denial triggered a rebuke from the European ombudsman, Emily O’Reilly, who adopted up with an investigation final 12 months and blasted EU officers over poor administration and an absence of transparency, saying that “no try was made to determine if any textual content messages existed.” The ombudsman then urged the fee to “search once more,” asking it to broaden its standards in a approach that may truly find the information.
Learn extra
EU Fee lambasted over Pfizer vaccine deal secrecy
The fee doubled down in its newest response to O’Reilly, nonetheless, insisting it had dealt with the matter correctly and made each effort to search out the texts. It reiterated that it doesn’t register materials that accommodates no “vital info,” and that such paperwork “usually are not stored, and, as a consequence, usually are not within the possession of the establishment.”
“The European Fee is of the opinion that it has not handled this request in a ‘slim approach’ and that the search and dealing with of paperwork for the aim of public requests for entry to paperwork … is justified and follows the established observe,” it continued.
The physique added that it intends to “subject additional steerage on fashionable communication instruments” in hopes of avoiding related mix-ups sooner or later, however nonetheless held that its actions have been “in keeping with the relevant laws and the related case legislation on entry to paperwork.”
The workplace of the ombudsman, which revealed the fee’s letter on Wednesday, declared that the response was “problematic on a number of factors,” and famous “full evaluation” of the case would observe within the coming weeks.
The controversy over the lacking texts is just not the primary dispute relating to an absence of transparency within the EU’s vaccine dealings, because the fee was sued in April by a number of MEPs, who claimed the negotiations have been overly secretive. Although contracts have been finally revealed, they have been closely redacted in a approach that “made it not possible to know the content material of the agreements,” the lawmakers alleged, insisting secrecy “has no place in public agreements with pharmaceutical firms.”
READ MORE: EU fee sued over Covid-19 vaccine secrecy
