Balkan States Race to Secure COVID-19 Vaccine Supplies

Those that are self-financing will be guaranteed sufficient doses to protect a certain proportion of their population, depending on how much they buy into it; funded countries will receive enough doses to vaccinate up to 20 per cent of their population in the longer term.

The WHO says the programme represents "a huge success for multilateralism and cooperation."

But that has not stopped many countries from pursuing insurance policies through separate, bilateral agreements with vaccine manufacturers. And the countries of the Balkans are no exception. The sums of money involved, however, are still largely secret.

Concern over vaccine hoarding

Margaret Keenan, the first patient in the United Kingdom to receive the Pfizer/BioNtech COVID-19 vaccine. Photo: EPA-EFE/Jacob King / POOL.

The European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, is running a single central procurement procedure with vaccine manufacturers on behalf of all 27 member states, including Balkan countries Croatia, Bulgaria and Romania.

A spokesperson for the Commission said member states had signed an agreement under the EU Vaccines Strategy "setting out their commitment not to enter into parallel negotiations with vaccine manufacturers to those being led by the EU."

According to the Croatian Public Health Institute, as part of the EU Vaccine Strategy, the country has ordered 5.6 million doses of coronavirus vaccine for the first phase of vaccination from a number of manufacturers including AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna and CureVac.

Prices, however, "are a corporate secret," the Institute says on its website, "and the negotiators agree to not disclose this information to the public."