6OM MORE DOSES TO BE MADE HERE
Deal to boost domestic supply in wake of EU threats to cut off vaccine exports
BRITAIN is to massively ramp up its vaccine production following EU threats to cut supplies.
Up to 60million doses of the new Novavax vaccine will be produced in the North East.
Ministers had already put plans in place to manufacture the vaccine at Billingham, County Durham. Under a new deal with Glaxo-Smith-Kline, the vaccine will now be ‘finished and filled’ at a separate site in nearby Barnard Castle.
The town hit the headlines last year as the destination for a lockdown-busting car journey by the PM’s adviser Dominic Cummings ‘to test his eyesight’.
Boris Johnson said the new deal would provide ‘a significant new weapon in our armoury against Covid’. Without it, the vaccine might have had to be sent abroad for the ‘fill and finish’ process in which the raw vaccine is transferred into vials for distribution.
Last week, the European Commission approved extraordinary new powers that would allow it to block the exports of Covid jabs to countries like the UK which have higher vaccination rates.
EU leaders backed away from immediate use of the powers, but a compromise deal which could see the UK share some vaccines produced at an AstraZeneca plant in the Netherlands has not yet been finalised. The EU’s powerful internal market commissioner Thierry Breton yesterday said the UK was ‘totally dependent’ on Europe for vaccine supplies.
‘The British are incapable of carrying out the vaccine policy alone,’ he said.’ Britain had to produce today only 10million vaccines. We have delivered 20million doses to help the British. They are totally dependent on us.’
Mr Breton claimed the UK could have a ‘problem’ delivering second doses of the Pfizer vaccine, all of which are produced in Belgium.
The PM last night insisted that Britain would have enough supplies to provide all second doses.
But a government source acknowledged that concerns about export bans was driving ministers to seek more domestic capacity. ‘I think everyone can see the importance of having domestic capacity for critical supplies like vaccines,’ the source said. ‘The events of the last few weeks have only served to underline that.’
Ministers are also trying to unlock five million doses from India, which appear to have been blocked from export to the UK at the request of the Indian government.
Millions of doses of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine are already produced in the UK. The new Valneva vaccine is also due to be manufactured in Scotland.
The Novavax vaccine is yet to be approved by regulators, but ministers hope supplies will come on stream later this year.
Britain will not donate Covid vaccines to Ireland or other EU states until all adults in the UK have been offered the jab, Downing Street said yesterday.
Reports at the weekend suggested ministers were ready to offer Dublin 3.7million doses to help speed up the lifting of lockdown on the island of Ireland. The idea was welcomed by Northern Ireland’s First Minister Arlene Foster. But No 10 yesterday played down the prospect of an early shipment across the Irish Sea.
The PM’s spokesman said: ‘Our first priority is to protect the British public. We hope to offer the vaccine to all over-50s by midApril and all adults by the end of July. We do not currently have a surplus of vaccines.’ A government source said ministers ‘expect to be able to identify any surplus later this year’.
‘They are totally dependent on us’