A first from Oxford
Dialysis patient’s delight to be at the front of the queue for inoculation
AN 82-year-old dialysis patient has become the first person in the world to get an approved dose of the Oxford vaccine against coronavirus.
Retired maintenance manager Brian Pinker received his jab in the city at 7.30am alongside one of the lead scientists behind the vaccine project, Professor Andrew Pollard.
Roll-out of the jab started yesterday in Oxford, London, Brighton, Morecambe and Nuneaton.
Brian, who has kidney disease, said: “I am so pleased to be getting the Covid vaccine today and really proud that it is one that was invented in Oxford.
“The nurses, doctors and staff today have all been brilliant and I can now really look forward to celebrating my 48th wedding anniversary with my wife Shirley later this year.
“The vaccine means everything to me. It’s the only way I’ll be getting back to normal life. This virus is terrible.”
He said it’s a “no-brainer” that people should ensure they get vaccinated. Brian added: “It took me long enough to be a star.”
Chief nurse Sam Foster, who administered the jab at Churchill Hospital, said: “It was a real privilege to be able to deliver the first Oxford vaccine just a few hundred metres from where it was developed.”
NHS England said it would be available in around 100 hospital hubs and 700 centres in GP practices and in the community by the end of the week. In the first few days a smaller number of doses are being administered so patients can be monitored.
PROUD
Prof Pollard, the director of the Oxford Vaccine Group, said: “It was an incredibly proud moment for me to receive the vaccine that the University of Oxford and the AstraZeneca teams have worked so hard to make available to the UK and the world.
“As a paediatrician specialising in infections, I know how important it is that healthcare workers along with other priority groups are protected as soon as possible – a crucial role in defeating this terrible disease.”
Health Secretary Matt Hancock said: “This is a pivotal moment.
“I hope it provides renewed hope to everybody that the end of this p pandemic is in sight.” There are officially ficially 530,000 doses of the Oxfordxfordady AstraZeneca vaccine ready to go from today, along with ith an additional 450,000 arriving ving in the next 24 hours.
A further three million on doses are reportedly in n vials awaiting safety checks, a process that should take a few days.
There are 15 million more doses awaiting “fill and finish” – the process of filling vials and packaging doses. AstraZeneca, based in Cambridge, says it should take only days.
Each batch needs to pass a 20- day sterility test and quality checks.
HOPE Vial of the vaccine
Wale Wales received its initial suppl supply of 22,000 doses as the first O Oxford vaccine injections were ad administered yesterday. P Pat Hier, 88, who was a among the first to receive it at Pontcae Medical Centre in Merthyr Tydfil, said: “It’s not going to provide you with 100% immunity but at least you’ve got some
immunity. It gives you something to look forward to, and hopefully things will improve.”
A report published last night by the Adam Smith Institute showed Israel has managed to vaccinate at a rate 10 times faster than the UK.
Boris Johnson said while visiting Chase Farm Hospital in North London to watch people get the jab that there will be a massive ramp-up.
Experts have said at least two million doses a week need to be administered to keep deaths below what they were during the first wave.
The PM said: “The rate-limiting factor is not supply of vaccines... it’s getting them properly tested and getting them to the NHS.
“It’s not the ability to distribute the vaccine, it’s not the shortage of staff.
It’s getting it properly tested. That will ramp up in the weeks ahead.”
GPs warned last week of a need for a bigger recruitment drive to vaccinate the UK. Retired doctors, military personnel and even firefighters could be signed up.
St John Ambulance is of fering 30,000 volunteers. Immunity does not develop for about three weeks so the NHS’s ability to cope will not initially be helped. Driven by a mutant variant, infections are rising everywhere.
There were 26,626 people with Covid- 19 in English hospitals yesterday – a third more than the
April peak. This is a w e e k- o n - w e e k increase of 30%, and is a new record high.
In London the number stood at 6,733, up 36%. While in eastern England it was 3,623, up 44%.
Dr June Raine, chief executive of re g u l ator the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, has suggested that there could be more vaccines to come.
The Oxford jab is the second to be made available. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was the first, four weeks ago.
The vaccine means everything... And it took me long enough to be a star
BRIAN PINKER, 82, ON BEING FIRST TO HAVE THE OXFORD JAB