The United Kingdom has become the first country in the world to approve the Pfizer / BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine, paving the way for mass vaccinations to begin as early as next week.
Britain’s medicines regulator says the vaccine, which offers up to 95% protection against Covid-19, is safe to be rolled out to the general public. The regulator took just five days to evaluate and approve the Pfizer vaccine.
Now, the first 800,000 doses of the vaccine will be available in the United Kingdom as early as next week, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said in a public statement. Elderly people, those in care homes and healthcare workers will be prioritized to get the vaccine first, the government said.
The Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine is the fastest vaccine to go from concept to reality, taking only 10 months to follow the same steps that normally span 10 years. The United Kingdom has ordered 40 million doses of the vaccine – enough to vaccinate 20 million people.
The doses will be rolled out as quickly as Pfizer can make it, with the first load to be available next week and then several million more to become available throughout December. But the bulk of the vaccine rollout will occur in 2021, the government said.
There will be three ways of vaccinating people across the U.K.: at hospitals, vaccination centres, and in the community at doctor’s offices and pharmacies. Around 50 hospitals are on stand-by and vaccination centres – in venues such as conference centres and sports stadiums – are now being set-up across the U.K.