A Belgian court ordered Poland to pay €1.3 billion for an undelivered shipment of Covid-19 vaccines in a lawsuit filed by US pharmaceutical giant Pfizer.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen negotiated portions of the May 2021 Pfizer contract, for the company to deliver a set number of vaccine doses over several years.
In April 2022, Poland, though, refused to comply with the arrangement, citing the end of the pandemic, the war in Ukraine and Pfizer’s possible abuse of its dominant market position.
Romania later took the same step.
Pfizer sued both countries in late 2023 to force them to follow the contract.
The Brussels court rejected the two countries’ arguments and ordered Poland and Romania to take delivery of the vaccine doses, with Poland ordered to pay Pfizer €1.3 billion and Romania €600 million.
Poland’s then Conservative (PiS) government ordered shipment of the vaccines before the country’s health ministry realised it already had far more doses than it would need.
At the time Poland already possessed more than 20 million unused vaccines, which ultimately had to be disposed of in 2024.
The Polish health ministry notified Pfizer and the EC in April 2022 it would not accept or pay for the shipment. It cited legal arguments based on the concept of force majeure, which can free a contracted party from liability as a result of circumstances outside its control.
Warsaw argued the war in Ukraine, which began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of its neighbour in February 2022, required it to divert state funds and resources in an effort to aid Kyiv.
During the aftermath of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Union only allowed Poland to use its existing EU funding to confront its sudden refugee and security emergency.
The EU did not provide any additional resources to help Poland deal with the emergency and the country’s post-pandemic EU funding was blocked as well in 2023 for alleged rule of law violations in the PiS government’s judicial reforms.
While the health ministry in Warsaw said it would appeal the Belgian court’s decision, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk harshly criticised the previous PiS government for its actions that led to the court action.
In a social media post after the ruling, Tusk said: “The previous government led by the PiS PM Mateusz Morawiecki ordered Covid vaccines that it did not pick up and did not pay for.”
He said Poland would now “have to pay for the extreme stupidity” of PiS during the height of the pandemic, adding: “This is unfortunately not an April Fool’s joke.”
Morawiecki replied to Tusk on X saying the PM was displaying “hypocrisy of Himalayan proportions” and said in 2021 Tusk had stated Poland signing the contract with the EU for the vaccines was the best solution for the country.
Tusk’s ruling Civic Coalition had criticised the PiS government during the pandemic for ordering too few doses of the Covid vaccines. Its then-leader Borys Budka in 2021 called for an investigative parliamentary commission to investigate what he called a vaccine shortage.
