Britain’s business secretary Alok Sharma on Monday announced that the UK would get early access to 90 million doses of three promising Covid-19 vaccine candidates, including the one developed at the University of Oxford, whose initial results are due to be released later.
The three vaccine classes that the Boris Johnson government has secured through partnerships are: adenoviral vaccines (University of Oxford/AstraZeneca); mRNA vaccines (BioNTech/Pfizer, Imperial College London) and the inactivated whole virus vaccines (Valneva).
The United Kingdom is the worst affected country in Europe, with at least 45,300 deaths and nearly 3 lakh cases.
Sharma said: “The hunt to find a vaccine is a truly global endeavour and we are doing everything we can to ensure the British public get access to a safe and effective coronavirus vaccine as soon as possible”.
“This new partnership with some of the world’s foremost pharmaceutical and vaccine companies will ensure the UK has the best chance possible of securing a vaccine that protects those most at risk”, he added.
Monday’s announcement follows an existing global licensing agreement signed with AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford to research, develop and manufacture a Covid-19 vaccine for the UK public. AstraZeneca will work to produce 100 million doses for the UK in total.
As part of a wider £131 million investment by the government, support has also been given to Imperial College London to develop their vaccine candidate, which started human studies in June.
Officials said the UK government has committed £250 million to the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations – the biggest investment of any country – to support equitable and affordable access to new coronavirus vaccines and treatments around the world.
The government on Monday also launched the NHS Covid-19 vaccine research registry to enlist volunteers for future vaccine studies. To enable large-scale vaccine studies to take place across the UK, the aim is to get 500,000 people signed up by October.
Health secretary Matt Hancock said: “A safe and effective vaccine is our best hope of defeating coronavirus and returning to life as normal”.
“We have some of our best scientists and researchers working on this, but members of the public have a vital role to play too. So I urge everyone who can to back the national effort and sign up to the NHS Covid-19 vaccine research registry to help find a vaccine as soon as possible”.
