What the commentators said

“The world has moved a step closer to ending the Covid-19 horror,” said Polly Toynbee in The Guardian. Oxford University’s researchers are among some 200 global teams working on a vaccine: success for any would be “a feat of astonishing human brilliance”. But the big risk is that a successful vaccine will go to those who need it least but have the deepest pockets, while countries where the virus is “most rampant” lose out. And that’s not the only problem, said Melanie Phillips in The Times. If and when a vaccine does become available, there’s evidence that “alarming” numbers would refuse it. A recent survey found that 14% of people in the UK would be unwilling to be vaccinated, while a further 13% hadn’t made up their mind.

I’ve long viewed a vaccine as the “promised land” in tackling Covid-19, said Tom Chivers on UnHerd – so it’s depressing to read warnings that immunity may only last a few months. But it doesn’t mean vaccines won’t be an enormous help: scientists reckon symptoms displayed by vaccinated people will be much milder. When a vaccine is eventually found, Covid will probably end up as an “inconvenient but not devastating seasonal illness” akin to the common cold.

In the meantime, it’d be wise to wear a mask, said Kat Lay in The Times: the evidence that face coverings slow the spread of the transmission is mounting. And scientists now reckon they also reduce the severity of infection by limiting the amount of virus that gets into people’s systems. Sceptics like me have been “overtaken” by the science, said Juliet Samuel in The Daily Telegraph. But getting the public on board will require work: the London Tube, for instance, is a “Petri dish of pathogens” – yet still not everyone is covering up. That’s hardly a surprise, said Dan Hodges in The Mail on Sunday. In too many areas – most recently the debate over face masks and when workers should return to offices – No. 10’s messaging has been characterised by “chaos and confusion”. The PM needs to get a much firmer grip on the crisis if he is to have any chance of persuading the public that it’s safe for life to go back to normal any time soon.