‘UK cannot borrow its way out of hole’
Hard choices ahead, Chancellor warns virtual Tory conference
CHANCELLOR Rishi Sunak said there would be “hard choices” to come as he attempts to balance the books following the coronavirus crisis.
Mr Sunak told the Conservative Party conference that he could not continue to “borrow our way out of a hole”. He acknowledged that the pandemic had already forced ministers to make “difficult trade-offs and decisions” but promised the “overwhelming might of the British state” was being used to help as many people as possible.
The Chancellor warned that the UK was only “part way through” the coronavirus outbreak, which had already reached “deep into our economy and society”.
The Government has committed more than £190 billion for people, firms and services but elements of that support – including the furlough scheme, which ends this month and supports many jobs in hospitality and tourism in the Westcountry – are now being withdrawn.
Mr Sunak said the Government had “stood between the people and the danger and we always will”. However, he warned that changes to the economy cannot be ignored and no chancellor could protect every job or business.
His priority, he said, was to “create, support and extend opportunity to as many people as I can.”
EXETER’S Nightingale Hospital is now being utilised to carry out a vital Covid-19 vaccine study.
Local volunteers are taking part in the world’s first “phase three” study to test the effectiveness of the new Novavax Covid-19 vaccination.
The study will also test the safety of the promising new vaccine which has been developed by US biotechnology company Novavax.
If any of the vaccines are successful in clinical studies, they could start to be delivered to the UK in 2021.
It is expected that these vaccines would first be given to priority groups such as frontline health and social care workers, ethnic minorities, adults with underlying health conditions, and the elderly based on Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI ) advice.
A broad spectrum of thousands of people from a variety of age groups and backgrounds are taking part to give researchers an insight on a much larger population than the phase one and two studies.
Royal Devon and Exeter NHS Foundation Trust’s NIHR Patient Recruitment Centre will use the £23m Exeter Nightingale Hospital to deliver the study locally.
Exeter’s former Homebase site in Moor Lane, Sowton, was transformed into a 116-bed hospital within six weeks.
Initially it was built to treat Covid19 patients, but due to relatively low numbers of coronavirus in the region it is instead being utilised for diagnostic testing, in particular cancer, as well as reducing hospital backlogs in the area, and for training overseas nurses.
It opened on July 6, and is operational seven days a week, from 8am to 8pm.
Dr Thomas Burden, vaccine lead for the NIHR Clinical Research Network South West Peninsula, and respiratory consultant at the Royal Devon and Exeter NHS FoundationTrust, said: “We are delighted to be able to offer people in the South West the opportunity to participate in this important and exciting research.
“We have all been affected by Covid-19 in differing ways and we look forward to contributing towards what we hope will be an effective vaccine to enable recovery from this devastating epidemic.”
More than 9,000 people across Devon, Cornwall and parts of Somerset have now volunteered to take part in Covid-19 vaccine studies through the NHS Vaccines Registry. Of those, 500 of those local volunteers are taking part in phase three.
More volunteers from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds are being sought to take part in the study, as well as those with longterm health conditions.
Nationally 10,000 volunteers will be needed to take part in the study. The number of people who have signed up to the NHS Vaccine Registry has now hit 250,000.
The Registry was launched in July to help create a database of people who consent to be contacted by the NHS to take part in clinical studies, to help speed up the development of a safe and effective vaccine.
The phase three trials are the second to commence in the UK and will be undertaken at a number of National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) regional sites across the UK, including Exeter.
With several more studies for potential vaccine candidates expected to start before the end of the year, UK researchers are calling for additional volunteers to sign up to take part in research.
Business secretary Alok Sharma said: “We are fighting coronavirus with all our might and we all have our part to play. One of the most effective ways we can defeat coronavirus is by finding a safe successful vaccine as quickly as possible, so that our lives can start returning to normal.
“I am incredibly proud of the 250,000 invaluable volunteers who have signed up for vaccine clinical studies across the UK.
“We want even more people to join them and sign up to the Vaccines Registry, so that scientists and researchers can make sure potential vaccines are completely safe and effective.”
The government has secured 60 million doses of the Novavax vaccine for the UK, which will be manufactured using FUJIFILM Diosynth Biotechnologies’s facilities in Billingham, Stockton-on-Tees.
This will ensure that, once approved by regulators, the vaccine can be supplied as quickly as possible.
Professor Paul Heath, Novavax phase three trial chief Investigator and Professor of Paediatric Infectious Diseases at St George’s University Hospitals NHS FoundationTrust said: “This is only the second phase three vaccine study to be initiated in the UK, and the first phase three study with the Novavax vaccine anywhere in the world, which shows the importance that has been placed on rapidly finding a solution for this urgent public health need.
“The vaccine has successfully gone through its early safety trials and we’re extremely encouraged by its performance so far.”
For more information about volunteering go to www.nhs.uk and click on “take part in coronavirus health research