What the commentators said
“We’ve been here before,” said Mattie Brignal on Reaction.life. In March, Boris Johnson was confident that we’d “turn the tide” on Covid within 12 weeks. In July, he predicted life would be back to normal by Christmas. This time, though, there really are grounds for optimism. The Pfizer vaccine, of which the NHS has 40 million pre-ordered doses, could be cleared for use very soon. Moderna’s candidate, five million doses of which are earmarked for the UK, may also not be far off. But the real game changer promises to be the Oxford vaccine, said Sarah Boseley in The Guardian, of which we’ve ordered 100 million doses – enough to immunise the UK’s entire adult population. It’s both much cheaper than the other two vaccines (£3 a dose, as opposed to more than £15) and easier to transport, as it’s stable at normal fridge temperature. There is also some evidence that it might reduce transmission as well as protecting individuals.
The Oxford vaccine looks very promising, said Tom Whipple in The Times, but it’s still early days. The analysis that produced the 90% efficacy figure was based on a relatively small subset of cases. And it’s important to remember that all these vaccine trials “happened in a very strange world: a world of mask-wearers and elbow bumps”. Their effectiveness in normal conditions, when people would be exposed to more viral particles, remains to be seen.
The challenge involved in distributing and administering vaccines must also be taken into account, said Paul Hudson in the FT. In the US alone, 850 million needles and syringes will be needed to deliver Covid and flu vaccines. “In May, the Strategic National Stockpile held just 15 million syringes.” The good news for Britain is that the NHS is good at vaccinations, said Paul Nuki in The Daily Telegraph. Every year it inoculates at least 15 million older people against seasonal flu. Experts believe that, if things go well, all of those most vulnerable to Covid in the UK could be vaccinated by the end of April. The fear is that “a third wave of the virus sparked by an overly merry Christmas” could disrupt the process by monopolising the attention of GPs, nurses and pharmacists. All the more reason, then, for “a quiet Christmas 2020”.