On Wednesday, the United Kingdom became the first country to formally approve the Pfizer and BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine, a great milestone in the fight against the pandemic.
What We Know:
- The first vaccinations are set to arrive and be administered next week, the government said. However, the initial batch of 800,000 will cover a moderately small amount of healthcare workers, care home staff and residents, and seniors over the age of 80.
- The vaccine has been approved more quickly than any other in history. Its rapid development surpassed the 15 to 20 years it normally takes to produce these types of medicines.
- President Donald Trump has blamed the Food and Drug Administration for “dragging its feet,” while the FDA states it’s just taking the time to make the right call. The British government said Wednesday, FDA regulators will discuss the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine next week, by which time it will already be accessible across the U.K.
“It’s fantastic,” Prime Minister Boris Johnson stated. “It’s the protection of vaccines that will ultimately allow us to reclaim our lives and get the economy moving again.”
- According to Johns Hopkins University, the U.K. has one of the highest Covid-19 deaths globally, behind only Italy, Spain, Peru, and Belgium.
- The vaccine by Pfizer, a U.S. pharmaceutical giant, and its German partner BioNTech is one of three front-runners that have produced promising results in recent weeks. Clinical trials found it was 95 percent effective at preventing symptomatic Covid-19, Pfizer said.
- The U.K. ordered 40 million doses, sufficient for a third of the population, given that this is a two-shot regimen. None of these have been delivered yet, and most of them won’t come until next year. Every time a new shipment is sent over, it will have to be tested again by the U.K.’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, or MHRA.
- The shots must be kept at minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit, needing specialist dry-ice freezers that some doctor surgeries and even some hospitals do not have. Pfizer-BioNTech states the vaccine can be kept for its final five days at normal refrigerator temperature.
In the U.S., Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna have sent forms to the FDA for emergency use permission. The FDA is expected to meet to talk about the vaccines next week.
