[ 2021-02-11 ]

AstraZeneca on course to roll out vaccine for new Covid variants by autumn
AstraZeneca has predicted that it will be able to
modify the Covid-19 vaccine it has developed with
Oxford to protect against new variants of the
coronavirus in time for the autumn.

The drugmaker has said that it is confident that
the present vaccine, a workhorse of the NHS
immunisation campaign, will be effective against
the fast-spreading “Kent variant”, which
fuelled a surge of cases across Britain late last
year.

In the meantime, Boris Johnson has appealed for
the final two million people who are over 70 or
work in healthcare and who have not yet been
vaccinated to come forward, warning that leaving
large numbers unprotected could delay the easing
of lockdown.

GPs are being urged to make personal calls to all
their older patients who have not had the jab,
while roving teams will seek out care home staff
who have been missed.

There is much more uncertainty about whether the
Oxford vaccine will give good protection against
variants that contain a mutation known as E484K,
which was first seen in strains of the virus that
originated in Brazil and South Africa and has
occurred independently in the UK

Source - The Times, UK

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