LONDON, Jan 18 (Reuters) - Britain's vaccine rollout is
limited by "lumpy" manufacturing and Pfizer's changes to its
production could lead to brief supply disruption, Vaccine
Deployment Minister Nadhim Zahawi said on Monday.
Zahawi told LBC radio that the United Kingdom was hoping for
2 million vaccines a week from AstraZeneca but that
those numbers will not be reached until mid February.
"It's been a bit lumpy," Zahawi said of vaccine manufacture.
"There's bound to be delays. Any new manufacturing process
has challenges at the outset, it is lumpy, it begins to
stabilise and get better and better week in, week out," he told
the BBC.
"The Pfizer BioNTech vaccine is a messenger RNA chemical,
difficult chemical to manufacture, very very challenging but
they're doing really well, they want to do more which is why
they're reconfiguring to add volume to the whole world."
"That could delay supply but I'm confident we can meet our
target."
(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Kate Holton)