London mayor raises alarm on overloaded hospitals
LONDON — London’s mayor declared the capital’s covid-19 situation to be critical Friday, reflecting deteriorating conditions for beleaguered hospitals, as the country recorded its highest daily death toll in the pandemic.
The grim news that another 1,325 people had died within 28 days of a positive test was revealed hours after the U.K regulator authorized a third vaccine for emergency use. The figure brings Britain’s official death toll from the coronavirus to 79,833, the highest in Europe. Not all the deaths announced by the government on Friday occurred on the same day.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan declared a “major incident,” as the rapid spread of the virus pushed hospitals to breaking point, with the number of hospitalized coronavirus patients up 27% in the week leading up to Jan. 6. One in 30 people in Britain’s capital was infected with the virus in the week to Wednesday, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Other emergency services are also under strain, with hundreds of firefighters now driving ambulances, for example.
“Our heroic doctors, nurses and [National Health Service] staff are doing an amazing job, but with cases rising so rapidly, our hospitals are at risk of being overwhelmed,” Khan said. “The stark reality is that we will run out of beds for patients in the next couple of weeks unless the spread of the virus slows down drastically.”
A major incident is defined as one in which there is a risk to life and welfare and is “beyond the scope of business-as-usual operations.” It allows coordination among different emergency agencies and will let London ask for help from other areas.
Khan, a member of the opposition Labor Party, also wrote to Conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnson asking for more financial support for Londoners who need to self-isolate and are unable to work, and called for masks to be worn in crowded outdoor spaces as well as indoors.
The action comes as more good news on fighting the virus appeared with the approval of the Moderna vaccine as the country ramps up an inoculation program critical to lifting the U.K. out of the pandemic.
The Department of Health said Friday that the vaccine meets the British medicines regulator’s “strict standards of safety, efficacy and quality.” Britain has ordered 17 million doses set to be delivered by the spring.
“Vaccines are the key to releasing us all from the grip of this pandemic, and today’s news is yet another important step towards ending lockdown and returning to normal life,” Business Secretary Alok Sharma said.
So far, Britain has inoculated 1.5 million people with the Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford University-AstraZeneca vaccines. It plans to vaccinate some 15 million people by mid-February.
Meanwhile, the European Union’s drug agency on Friday approved doctors drawing one more dose from each vial of the coronavirus vaccine made by Pfizer-BioNTech, in a move that — combined with the purchase of 300 million extra shots of the serum — could speed up the pace of vaccinations in the 27-nation bloc.
The European Medicines Agency said its human medicines committee recommended updating the product information for the vaccine to clarify that each vial contains six doses instead of the five that were advised when it originally approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine on Dec. 21.
German Health Ministry spokesman Hanno Kautz told reporters in Berlin that the change would come into effect immediately, boosting available doses of the vaccine by 20%.
Many doctors across the EU have already been drawing six doses of the vaccine from each vial, a practice that is already permitted in the United States, Britain and elsewhere.
Pharmaceutical companies regularly put more vaccine than necessary into vials so that minimum dosage can be ensured even if there is some spillage.
The news came shortly after the EU’s executive arm said it had secured 300 million extra doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the new agreement to buy more doses will double the amount ordered by the 27-nation bloc.
The EU commission later detailed in a statement that it offered to member states to purchase an additional 200 million doses of the vaccine, with the option to acquire another 100 million doses.
In Iran, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday banned the country from importing of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Astrazeneca vaccines, a reflection of mistrust toward the West.
In a televised speech, he said the import of American and British vaccines were “forbidden,” referring to the surging death tolls from the virus in both countries.
“I really do not trust,” them, Khamenei said of those nations. “Sometimes they want to test” their vaccines on other countries, adding, “I am not optimistic [about] France,” either.
Iran has struggled to stem the worst virus outbreak in the Middle East.