On persuading Novartis

Sergio Dompè, the president of the association of pharmaceutical industry (Farmindustria), hopes that Novartis and the Italian government will reach a new agreement to change their contract and to convert the swine flu vaccine supply in something else. Instead of buying other doses, the government will buy other products. Dompè said that, considering the actual need, it's understandable to find a way to make more efficient the expenditure (184 million euros). He also added that he will try to persuade Novartis to change the contract. Only 865,000 people in Italy got the swine flu shot, while some 10 millions of doses are stocked. Other 14 millions of doses have been ordered but not yet delivered.

The secret agreement

Altreconomia, an Italian magazine, has published on-line the “secret agreement” between the Italian government and the pharmaceutical company Novartis to buy 24 million doses of the swine flu vaccine. The article said that the agreement was too partial to Novartis, because the company was liable only for damages caused by defects of production, it was made no responsible for any delay in the production, and also because the vaccines were too expensive (168 million euro + VAT). These were the objections made by the article, that were reported by many other media. There's a feeling in Italy that the vaccination campaign has been a big business for the pharmaceuthical companies, not accetable given the mildness of the pandemic. The objections were first risen by a decision of Corte dei Conti, the court of law that checks that the financial government's acts are in accordance with the rules. The Corte dei Conti concluded that the government had to accept such unfavourable provisions because of the urgency of the matter. Actually, the timing of the production and delivery of the vaccines has been one of the troubles, but on this issue there's no debating.

Media: Poland refuses the flu vaccine

Today the main piece of news is about Poland that is "calm and unvaccinated." Italian online media are really interested in this story:

Despite a serious outbreak of swine flu in neighboring Ukraine, the Polish government played it cool last week. Polish Health Minister Ewa Kopacz announced that she was not planning to stock up on swine-flu vaccine until it had been properly tested.
"The A/H1N1 vaccine is being produced by three companies, none of which has been able to assess its long-term effects. Their testing lasted a relatively short amount of time. It is not known whether [the vaccine] is safe for children and pregnant women," the health minister explained at a press conference last week.

The safety of the flu vaccine, in Italy the Focetria by Novartis, is still strongly debated. The daily government's report have updated the death toll to 62.