COVID-19 VACCINE WILL BE OPTIONAL, NHS TO BE READY FOR VACCINE BY DECEMBER: UK MINISTER

Tue 10 November 2020:

On Monday, early results from the word’s first effective coronavirus vaccine showed it could prevent more than 90% of people from getting Covid.

The British government has asked the National Health Service to be ready to deploy any COVID vaccine from the start of December and it will then roll it out, starting with the most vulnerable, the health minister said on Tuesday.

Matt Hancock told Sky News that there were many hurdles still to clear and the government would not deploy the shot until it was confident in its clinical safety.

News on Monday that a vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech was more than 90% effective sparked a surge in financial markets around the world, a rare piece of good news in the fight against a disease that has killed more than a million people.

Britain expects to have 10 million doses of the vaccine available by the end of the year.

“I’ve asked them (the NHS) to be ready from the start of December,” he said.

“Of course there are many hurdles that need to be gone over and we haven’t seen the full safety data and obviously that is critical and we won’t deploy a vaccine unless we can be confident in its clinical safety.”

He added that he did not know when there would be an update on the trial results of a vaccine being produced by Oxford University and AstraZeneca.

Hancock told BBC vaccination clinics would be open seven days a week and centres set up in places such as sports halls.

But he urged people to be patient and said “we just don’t know” how many people will need to be vaccinated before life can return to normal.

Mr Hancock said: “We still appeal this morning for people’s patience, firstly to follow existing rules. Because this is still a deadly disease and this is not over yet.

“Even once we start to roll it out, we still need to look after ourselves, look after our community by following the rules and being careful to stop the spread of transmission.”

Vaccine will be optional

People in Britain will be able to decide whether they want to have the coronavirus vaccine or not, health minister Matt Hancock said on Tuesday, reported by Reuters . adding that children will not need to be vaccinated.

“We’re not proposing to make this compulsory, not least because I think the vast majority people are going to want to have it,” Hancock told BBC TV on Tuesday.

“This is not for children and children have a very low susceptibility to coronavirus,” he added.

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