LONDON (Reuters) – Britain begins vaccinating its population with Oxford University and AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 shot for Monday in a world premiere, vying to provide protection for the elderly and vulnerable as a further increase in cases threatens to overwhelm hospitals.
Britain has claimed a scientific “triumph” that puts it at the forefront of the West, as dialysis patient Brian Pinker, 82, became the first person to receive the Oxford / AstraZeneca shootings outside a trial.
As major powers see the benefits of emerging from the pandemic, Britain is rushing to vaccinate its population faster than the United States and the rest of Europe, although Russia and China have been inoculating their citizens for months.
Less than a month after Britain became the first country in the world to launch the vaccine developed by Pfizer, and the German company BioNTech, Pinker, which has kidney disease, received the Oxford / AstraZeneca blow.
“I am so excited to receive the COVID vaccine today and am very proud that it was invented in Oxford,” said Pinker, a retired maintenance manager, just a few hundred meters from where the vaccine was developed.
Pinker said he is looking forward to celebrating his 48th wedding anniversary with his wife Shirley in February.
The UK, which is facing the sixth highest number of deaths in the world and one of the worst economic successes in the COVID crisis, has seen a resurgence of cases to new highs.
This put a renewed urgency on the launch plans. The UK gives priority to getting a first dose of vaccine to as many people as possible rather than giving a second dose, despite the fact that some doctors and scientists have expressed concern.
Since the launch of the Pfizer vaccine on December 8, Britain has put more than a million COVID-19 vaccines into arms – more than the rest of Europe has put together, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said.
“This is a triumph of British science that we have managed to get to where we are,” Hancock told Sky. “Right from the start, I saw that the vaccine was the only way out in the long run.”
The government of Prime Minister Boris Johnson has provided 100 million doses of Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine that can be stored at refrigerator temperatures between two and eight degrees, making it easier to distribute than the Pfizer shot.
Six hospitals in England administer the first of 530,000 doses prepared by the UK. The program will be expanded to hundreds of other British sites in the coming days, and the government hopes to deliver tens of millions of doses in a few months.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it has administered 4.2 million first doses of COVID-19 vaccines since Saturday morning and distributed 13.07 million doses.
But Israel is the world leader: more than a tenth of its population has been vaccinated, and Israel now administers more than 150,000 doses a day.
VACCINE RACE
The United Kingdom became the first Western country to approve and launch a COVID-19 vaccine. Others have taken a longer and more cautious approach, although Russia and China have inoculated their citizens for months with several different vaccines still being tested late.
On December 31, China approved its first COVID-19 vaccine for general public use, a photo taken by an affiliate of state-backed pharmaceutical giant Sinopharm. The company said it is 79% effective against the virus.
Russia said on November 24 that the Sputnik V vaccine was 91.4% effective, based on the intermediate results of late studies. Vaccinations began in August and have so far inoculated more than 100,000 people.
India approved the Oxford / AstraZeneca vaccine on Sunday for emergency use.
Two new variants of coronavirus complicate the COVID-19 response and could impose new national restrictions in England.
Scientists are not entirely confident that COVID-19 vaccines will work on a variant found in South Africa, said ITV political editor Robert Peston.
The cases were also fueled by a highly transmissible variant in the UK and over 75,000 people in the UK died of COVID within 28 days of a positive test.
Johnson said on Sunday that tougher restrictions are likely, even with millions already living below the strictest level of rules.
England is divided into four different levels, depending on the prevalence of the virus, and Hancock said the rules in some parts of the country at level 3 do not work clearly.
Asked if the government intends to impose a new national blockade, Hancock said: “We do not rule anything out.”
Andrew Pollard, head of the Oxford Vaccine Group, also received the vaccine on Monday.
“We are on the verge of being overwhelmed by this disease,” he told BBC TV. “I think (the vaccine) gives us a little hope, but I think we have a few difficult weeks ahead.”
Written by William James, Guy Faulconbridge and Alistair Smout; Editing by Susan Fenton, Kate Holton, Raissa Kasolowsky and Nick Macfie