BRUSSELS, March 19. /TASS/. A third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic could be "on the horizon" in Europe, and it is developing at different speeds in different EU countries, which calls for speeding up the vaccination process, Director for Political Communication at the European Commission Dana Spinant said during Friday’s briefing.

"A third wave could be on the horizon in a number of different countries, some countries may even be in the third wave already," she said. "Our position is that we want to considerably speed up the rollout of the vaccination program across the European Union."

The spokeswoman noted that the EU remains committed to the goal of vaccinating 70% of its adult population.

Earlier on Friday, German Health Minister Jens Spahn stated that there are not enough vaccines in Europe yet to stop a third wave of the pandemic.

According to the data announced on Thursday, the European Commission expects that in the first quarter of 2021, the EU can receive up to 100 mln vaccine doses from three Western companies: Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca. This is 40% fewer than the 166 mln doses ordered for this period by the European Commission under contracts with these three states signed and partially paid in the fall of 2020.

Currently, the EU’s leading states are toughening quarantine measures due to increasing COVID-19 infection rates. This is happening practically one year since the first lockdown in Europe in March 2020.