The OutbreakIssue the Twelfth
Thursday, December 31, 2020
The first vaccines go into arms in Britain, America and Singapore, a new variant cuts Britain off at Christmas, and India waits on its regulator.
LONDON, Thursday 31 December.—Britain approved the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine on Wednesday, the first country to do so, four weeks after it became the first in the world to approve the vaccine made by Pfizer and BioNTech.
The first Pfizer jab outside a trial went to Margaret Keenan, 90, at University Hospital Coventry at 6.31am on 8 December. “I feel so privileged to be the first person vaccinated against COVID-19,” she said. Simon Stevens, chief executive of NHS England, said Tuesday might be looked back on as marking “a decisive turning point in the battle against coronavirus”.
The first 800,000 doses are going to people over 80 and care-home workers.