HALF OF BRITONS COULD GET JAB IN MONTHS

30m Covid vaccine doses will be ready by September — if trials are successful

A CORONAVIRUS jab will be available by september if trials are successful, it emerged last night.

AstraZeneca has agreed to produce 30million vaccine doses for UK use – enough to vaccinate half the British population before the winter.

Business Secretary Alok Sharma, who announced a new multi-million pound deal with the pharmaceutical giant at last night’s Downing Street briefing, stressed that scientists have not yet proven if the vaccine works.

But the deal means if a trial led by Oxford University has positive results when it reports back this summer, officials will ‘have

dosages to start vaccinating the UK population straight away’, Mr Sharma said.

‘in order to definitively conquer this disease we need to find a safe, workable vaccine,’ he said, announcing that the Government has now ploughed more than quarter of a billion pounds into its search for a jab.

He revealed the first phase of the Oxford trial is now complete, with roughly 500 volunteers having received the vaccine and under careful monitoring. initial results could be back as soon as the middle of June, researchers hope, with a fuller picture due by September.

Under the terms of the ‘global licensing agreement’, AstraZeneca is to start mass production of the vaccine this summer, before results are due, in case it is found to work.

Some 30million doses will be reserved for the UK as part of a 100million-dose deal, some of the remainder of which will be sold cheaply to developing countries. it came as:

■ the Scottish Government faced a backlash over the failure to sign up a single recruit for its trace and test programme – despite more than 8,000 having volunteered;

■ Sunseekers flocked to parks and beaches to take advantage of relaxed lockdown restrictions in England;

■ Author Neil Gaiman provoked anger by holing up in Skye – after flying from New Zealand;

■ Ministers faced fresh questions about secrecy in the wake of the Nike conference infection outbreak;

■ the care sector warned it faces collapse as families are frightened to put loved ones into homes;

■ Experts warned those without smartphones could be treated as a ‘second class citizens’ as they will not be able to access an NHS app aimed at limiting the virus spread.

Mr Sharma praised Britain’s scientists for the ‘genuinely unprecedented’ speed at which they have jumped into action in searching for a vaccine. Usually it takes a decade or more to develop a new vaccine.

More than 80 teams around the world are now conducting vaccine trials but two of the UK teams – one at Oxford and one at imperial College London – are leading the hunt.

‘the UK will be the first country to get access to the vaccine, should it be successful,’ Mr Sharma said.

He announced new funding of £84million for vaccine research – £65.5million for Oxford and £18.5million for imperial, which is due to start trials of a different vaccine in the coming weeks.

that is on top of £47million already given to the projects. An additional £38million is going into a rapid deployment facility to begin coronavirus vaccine manufacturing from the summer – in addition to the AstraZeneca deal.

And £93million is going into fasttracking a long-term vaccine production centre near Oxford, which will now open in summer 2021 – one year ahead of schedule. ‘the centre… will have capacity to produce enough vaccine doses to serve the entire UK population in as little as six months,’ Mr Sharma said.

‘But if – and it is a big if – a successful vaccine is available later this year we need to be in a position to manufacture it at scale, and quickly.’

A Government source said a mass vaccination programme is being prepared so that as soon as the trial data is ready ‘we will be ready to go’. the Medical and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency is on standby to issue rapid approval for the vaccine as soon as the results are ready.

Professor Sir John Bell, who is leading the Oxford trial, said: ‘We now have a partner in AstraZeneca who are ideally positioned to help us evaluate the vaccine, manufacture it and distribute it to UK citizens as well as to the rest of the world. they share our commitment to true global access to end this pandemic.’

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