Who is next on the priority list for Covid vaccines – and how will I be contacted? – The Telegraph

How will the storage requirements of the Pfizer vaccine affect the programme?

The vaccine must be storedat -70C to be effective, meaning it can only be delivered to GPs with the facilities to keep it at that temperature.

It will be difficult to administer in care homes.Deputy chief medical officer professor Jonathan Van-Tam said: This is a complex product. It is not a yoghurt that can be taken out of the fridge and put back in several times.

It is understood the vaccine batches are being broken down into doses of 75, in order to give the vaccine toelderly residents and staff in homes with more than 50 beds to avoid wastage.

The Oxford vaccine does not need to be stored in such cold conditions - it can be kept at temperatures between 2C and 8C.

This means it is moremobile than the Pfizer jab and therefore more easily deployed into care homes of varying sizes and into private homes for individual doses.

Experts believe the Oxford jab will be easier to deploy beyond formal healthcare settings, in part because it does not need to be stored at such cold temperatures as the other approved vaccine.

Vaccine MinisterNadhimZahawi said that 8am-8pm inoculations will continue for those in the over-80s age group, but as more people in other age groupsbegin to receive the vaccine, "it becomes much more convenient for people to go late at night and in the early hours".

Mr Zahawi expected the scheme to be in operation in hospitals around London, and 50 vaccination centres, by February.

Additionally, three hospitals in Birmingham began offering 24-hour vaccinations for health and social staff from the night of Jan 20.

Offering vaccinations overnight will speed up the rollout, and allow the Government to reach their goal of vaccinating 32 million people - 60 per cent of the UK adult population by spring, which was announced on Jan 11.

The EU has threatened to block exports of the Pfizer vaccine following a row with the vaccine company, AstraZeneca.

On Jan 26, Brussels decided to impose tighter controls on exports afterreacting with furyto the news that AstraZenecawill deliver 50 million fewer doses to the EUthan it had expected.

The EU has said that it will "take any action required to protect its citizens", leading ministers to worry that the delivery ofPfizer vaccines to the UK will- at best - be delayed by extra paperwork.

This led the Governmentto say on Jan 31that it can "absolutely guarantee" its programme of delivery of the Covid-19 jab,amidthe row with the EU over vaccine supplies, with International trade secretary Liz Truss confirming that "contractual supplies won't be disrupted."

Two of the first NHS staff to get the jab suffered allergic reactionsandtheMedicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency warned the vaccine should not be administered topeoplewith a history of significantallergic reactions.

However, ProfStephen Powis said that this was common for new vaccines and the staff haverecovered well.

The South African variant and the Brazilian variant have threatened to undermine the vaccine and testing gains of recent months.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is expecting some vaccine tweaks to be needed as it has already begun to look at how quickly an altered jab could be approved, and Matt Hancock has said he is "very worried".

As of Feb 10, 141cases of the South Africa Covid-19 variant have been identified in the UK. Due to some cases not being linked to travel,door-to-door testing will take place in some parts of England.

This comes as scientists have found that theKent coronavirus variantis mutating to mimic theSouth African variant,which could render current vaccines less effective.

It was announced on Feb 7 that studies of the Oxford University-AstraZeneca jab have shown that itdoes not protect against mild and moderate infection of the South African variant.

However, vaccines against new coronavirus variants should be ready by October, the team behind theOxford University/AstraZeneca jabhas said.

On Jan 25, Moderna Inc announced that its vaccine was effective against the Kent and South African variants. Deliveries of the vaccine will take place in the spring.

Britain is also on the brink of approving a fourth coronavirus vaccine, after a jab trialed in the UK was shown to be highly effective against the Kent variant in what the Health Secretary hailed as a breakthrough.

Sixty million doses of the Novavax jab have been secured by the UK,which Mr Zahawi was himself injected with as part of the trial, which was shown to be 89.3 per cent effective in preventing coronavirus in participants.

Professor Paul Heath, the Novavax Phase 3 trial chief investigator, said he believed that vaccines could be adapted "at pace" to target new variants of coronavirus after the Novavax jab was found to be effective against the Kent variant.

Crucially, it was shown to be highly effective in preventing infection from the Kent variant whichBoris Johnson said on Jan 22 could be up to 30 per cent more deadly than the original.

Prof Neil Ferguson, who sits on Nervtag, the Government's virus advisory committee, said the latest data showed up to 13 in 1000 people aged 60 who contract the variant strain could die, compared with 10 in 1000 who caught the original variant.

"It is a realistic possibility that the new UK variant increases the risk of death, but there is considerable remaining uncertainty," Prof Ferguson told ITV.

The professor said the data available on the new variant is patchy, but there is a "signal" that there is a "1.3-fold increased risk of death".

However, most promisingly, on Jan 16, The Telegraph exclusively revealed that Britain would have the capacity to vaccinate the entire nation against new coronavirus strains within four months, once a new super-factory opens this year.

The government is currently looking to the future, and Boris Johnson has said that elderly and vulnerable people in the UK may have a coronavirus vaccine every year, similar to the roll-out of the annual flu jab.

Have you had the Covid vaccine or are you due to get one? We want to hear from you. Get in touch with us here.

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Who is next on the priority list for Covid vaccines - and how will I be contacted? - The Telegraph