BFF-25, 26 Pfizer-BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine: path ahead in UK

560

ZCZC

BFF-25

HEALTH-VIRUS-BRITAIN FACTS-NEWSERIES

Pfizer-BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine: path ahead in UK

LONDON, Dec 2, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – The British government has accepted
a recommendation by the country’s independent medicines regulator to
approve Pfizer-BioNTech’s Covid-19 vaccine for general use.

Here are some of the next steps.

– When will it be available? –

Pfizer said Wednesday it will begin transporting the vaccine to
Britain’s state-run National Health Service (NHS) within days.

The NHS, charged with delivering the free mass vaccination
programme, will start administering jabs to the most vulnerable early
next week.

“The NHS has decades of experience in rolling out successful
widespread vaccination programmes and has put in place extensive
deployment plans,” the UK’s health ministry said.

Pfizer said it has no current plans to provide the vaccine to
private sector buyers in Britain.

– How many doses are on order? –

The vaccine, which proved 95 percent effective in global trials,
requires two doses 21 days apart.

BioNTech and Pfizer have said they expect to supply up to 50 million
doses globally in 2020, and up to 1.3 billion in 2021.

Britain has pre-ordered 40 million doses in total, and expects to
receive an initial batch of 800,000 to begin next week’s rollout.

Pfizer says it will “scale up from there through the remaining weeks
of this year” and into 2021.

Regulators are still to approve the vaccine in the United States,
which has ordered 100 million doses, or in the European Union, where
300 million are on order.

– Who will get it first? –

UK health officials have drawn up criteria to decide when people
will receive any approved Covid-19 vaccines.

MORE/MRU/2353hrs

ZCZC

BFF-26

HEALTH-VIRUS-BRITAIN FACTS-NEWSERIES-TWO LAST

Preventing further deaths and protecting health and social care
staff and systems are the top priority.

Elderly care home residents and their carers will be the very first
to get inoculated, then those aged 80 and over and frontline health
and care staff.

Other elderly people and the clinically extremely vulnerable will be
next, with the rest of the population then prioritised by age.

In the US, a high-level panel of experts voted Tuesday for a similar
plan that will see health care workers and residents of long-term care
facilities get the jabs first.

– What are the challenges? –

Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine poses significant obstacles when it comes
to transport and storage.

It must be stored at -70 degrees Celsius (-94 degrees Fahrenheit),
temperatures much colder than those of a standard freezer, for periods
up to six months.

The vaccine will be manufactured at Pfizer’s plant in Puurs,
Belgium, and transported in temperature-controlled thermal shippers
that use dry ice.

It can then be stored for up to five days at 2-8 degrees Celsius,
which will allow for transportation and regular fridge storage at
distribution centres, according to Pfizer and the UK government.

The health ministry, which said last month it was “confident” in its
cold supply chain plans, said Wednesday it will initially only deliver
the vaccine to hospital hubs with ultra-cold storage capacity.

The doses will then also be distributed to “local community
services” and vaccination centres for administering.

– How did the UK approve it first? –

Britain’s independent Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory
Agency (MHRA) used a “rolling review” process since June to assess the
vaccine in record time.

“We have carried out a rigorous scientific assessment of all the
available evidence of quality, safety and effectiveness,” MHRA chief
executive June Raine said Wednesday.

“Our expert scientists and clinicians worked tirelessly, around the
clock, carefully, scientifically, robustly and rigorously poring over
hundreds of pages and tables of data, methodically reviewing the
data.”

Penny Ward, professor in pharmaceutical medicine at King’s College
London, said the MHRA was aided by being less constrained than the
European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the US Food and Drug
Administration.

“Unlike the EMA (European Medicines Agency), they can ask questions
as they go and obtain responses faster as a single agency,” she said.

BSS/AFP/MRU/2353hrs