The shameful decision of Pfizer’s chief executive officer, Albert Bourla, to cancel his participation in today’s debate organised by the European Parliament’s special committee on Covid-19 is completely unacceptable and cannot go unanswered, underline the S&Ds.

Today, the Parliament’s committee on Covid-19 will hold a debate with representatives of five pharmaceutical companies - Pfizer, CureVac, Novavax, Glaxo Smith Kline, and HIPRA. Pfizer is the only company who will not participate with their leading representative.

Let us not forget that the Covid-19 pandemic has cost the lives of millions of people, paralysed our societies and economies, and significantly increased inequalities. It is crucial that we learn from this experience and ensure that in the future, Europe is better prepared for such crises.

With this objective in mind, the S&Ds put forward the idea to set up the European Parliament’s special committee on Covid-19 to analyse all aspects of the pandemic and its implications. Not attending today’s debate is a blatant disregard of the committee’s important work.

Sara Cerdas MEP, S&D spokesperson on the Covid-19 committee, said:

“In the S&D Group, we are astonished by the decision of Albert Bourla, the CEO of Pfizer, to cancel his attendance at the Covid-19 committee meeting today.

“For us, transparency is key when it comes to the use of public money. The European Ombudsman and the European Court of Auditors have also made this claim very clearly in the context of the vaccine contracts between the European Commission and Pfizer.

“Pfizer has profited enormously of the pandemic and must be held responsible. It is shameful and not acceptable for Pfizer to avoid its accountability to us as lawmakers. In our view, this should have consequences for future cooperation with Pfizer.”