Irish woman behind EU Covid-19 vaccine rollout honoured as European of the Year

The Irish woman who led the EU rollout of the Covid-19 vaccine has been named as European of the Year.

Emer Cooke, the executive director of the European Medicines Agency, received her award at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) on Thursday evening.

The award is from the European Movement Ireland and previous recipients include John Hume, the former secretary general of the European Commission Catherine Day and the poet Brian Friel.

Ms Cooke recalled that approval of the Covid-19 vaccine was the first job in her inbox when she took over as executive director of the EMA in November 2020.

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Prior to the pandemic, the public were not interested in medicines regulation, but during the pandemic, it quickly became a “hot dinner topic alongside the latest celebrity news and Netflix shows”, she said.

“I like to remind people that it was science that developed the vaccine breakthroughs, it was science that freed us from lockdowns and it was scientists who gave us trusted, factual information when it mattered most.

“Of course, at the helm of EMA, I am mandated to say that, but it’s also what I believe in my head and my heart. This is science, therefore, this is fact. And we need scientists – and good science communicators – more than ever to bang that drum.”

European Movement Ireland chairwoman Julie Sinnamon said the public trusted Ms Cooke because she trusted the science. “However, at the core, I think we trusted Emer because we could see that she is driven by public service.”

Tributes were also paid to her by Ireland’s European Commissioner Mairead McGuinness who said Irish people were “honoured and proud” of what Ms Cooke had achieved.

Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly said Ms Cooke had exhibited “extraordinary leadership and extraordinary calm” given the pressures on her and the EMA to achieve a successful rollout of the vaccine programme.

Ms Cooke said she was accepting the award not only on her own behalf but on those who worked to ensure that more than 75 per cent of all adults in the EU have now received a Covid-19 vaccine.

“I’m very proud and very honoured. I see this as honouring all the people who worked so hard during Covid-19 and that nobody knows about,” she said.

“You don’t know about all the scientists across Europe who really helped to roll out these vaccines.”

Those in the audience included her husband Peter, her mother Anne and some of her seven siblings.

Ms Cooke said she never expected that the Covid-19 vaccine would be rolled out as quickly as it happened.

“It is the power of science, the power of international collaboration, the power of international co-ordination. Everything came together. It really shows that if you can work hard, you can make things happen,” he said.

Ms. Cooke holds a degree in pharmacy and two master’s degrees in science and in business administration from Trinity College Dublin. She began working in the EU in 1998.

Ms Cooke left Ireland 31 years ago to work as a manager at the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations and has been living in Europe since.

“I’m very proud of being Irish, of where I came from and I’m very proud of my heritage, but I’m also proud to be a European,” she said.

Ms Cooke will retain the role of executive director of the EMA until her five-year term ends in 2025.