Brian Pinker, 82, will receive the Oxford University / AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine from nurse Sam Foster at Churchill Hospital in Oxford, South West England, on January 4, 2021.
STEVE PARSONS | AFP | Getty Images
LONDON – The UK has begun the roll-out of the coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford, which marks another step in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
The country’s National Health Service (NHS) is the first in the world to deploy the shot after it was approved for use in the UK by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) last week. The NHS said 82-year-old Brian Pinker was the first person in the world to receive the shot Monday morning.
The approval and application of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine is seen as a boon in the race against Covid-19 because it is cheaper than alternatives made by Pfizer and BioNTech and Moderna.
In addition, and unlike competing vaccines, it can be stored, transported and handled under normal refrigerated conditions (2 to 8 degrees Celsius or 36 to 46 degrees Fahrenheit) for at least six months.
When the vaccine was approved last week, AstraZeneca said it intended to deliver “millions of doses in the first quarter” as part of the agreement with the UK government to deliver up to 100 million doses in total.
As a two-dose vaccine, the agreement means that up to 50 million people in the UK, with a population of around 66 million, can be vaccinated.
On Monday, the UK government said in a statement that more than half a million doses are now available “and that tens of millions more will be delivered in the coming weeks and months once batches are quality checked by the MHRA”.
The Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine complements a Covid-19 immunization program started by Britain in December, when it began rolling out the two-dose Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. More than a million people in the UK have already been vaccinated with the Pfizer injection, according to the government. It said on Monday that more than 730 vaccination sites have been set up in the UK, with hundreds more to open this week.
As with the Pfizer vaccine, the Oxford-AstraZeneca injection will be rolled out first to priority groups, including nursing home residents and staff, those over 80 and health and care providers, and then to the rest of the population in order of age and risk. , including those who are clinically extremely vulnerable.
‘Central moment’
UK Health Minister Matt Hancock said “this is a crucial moment in our fight against this terrible virus and I hope it gives everyone renewed hope that the end of this pandemic is in sight.”
The introduction of another vaccine could not come soon enough for the UK, which is facing a wave of infections, mainly attributed to a mutation of the virus that makes it easier to spread. The UK has now registered more than 2.6 million cases of the virus and more than 75,000 deaths to date, according to a figure from Johns Hopkins University.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Sunday that more restrictions on public life are likely to come as Covid-19 cases continue to increase.
On Monday, Hancock told Sky News that the UK cannot roll out the vaccine faster than the offer allows, but experts agree the UK should step up its vaccination program as soon as possible. Last week, a study from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine concluded that Britain needs to vaccinate two million people a week to prevent a third wave of the coronavirus outbreak.
On Saturday, The Times newspaper anonymously quoted a “key member of the Oxford-AstraZeneca team,” as saying the drug company would boost production so that two million jabs would be made every week by mid-January.
That goal is achievable but challenging, said Dr. Andrew Freedman, a reader in infectious diseases at Cardiff University School of Medicine. He told CNBC Monday that the speed of the rollout will depend on “the availability of the vaccine, vaccine production as well as the distribution and establishment of new vaccination centers and recruitment of new vaccinators.”
“It’s a goal, but it’s realistic and I think it can be achieved by the end of the month,” he told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe.”
Those most at risk will first be vaccinated with injections that are initially delivered to hospitals, before most of the supplies are sent to hundreds of doctor’s offices and nursing homes later in the week.
Somewhat controversially, the MHRA, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunization (JCVI) and the UK’s four Chief Medical Officers agreed to delay the gap between the first and second doses of the coronavirus vaccines now being given to the public. The change of strategy, they said, was to enable the protection of the greatest number of people in the shortest possible time.
The British Medical Association had said that the decision to delay the follow-up dose of the Pfizer vaccine and cancel appointments for patients already on the second dose was “extremely unfair” for thousands of at-risk patients. However, experts like Freedman said that for a vaccine like the Oxford-AstraZeneca candidate, a longer distance between doses could increase the effectiveness of the shot.
The government stressed last week that the “priority should be to give as many people in high-risk groups their first dose as possible, rather than giving the required two doses in the shortest possible time”.
“Everyone is still getting their second dose and it will be within 12 weeks of their first. The second dose completes the course and is important for longer term protection,” he added.