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* Researcher says on track to begin deployment in December
* Britain has ordered 100 million doses of the vaccine
* PM Johnson: news demonstrates that pandemic will end
(Adds UK PM Johnson)
By Alistair Smout and Natalie Thomas
LONDON, Nov 23 (Reuters) - Britain is on track to make
COVID-19 vaccines widely available by next spring after the shot
developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca was up to
90% effective in trials, the head of the university's Jenner
Institute told Reuters on Monday.
The encouraging late-stage interim trial results were the
third set of data showing efficacy levels among the seven
vaccine candidates Britain has ordered, after Pfizer/BioNTech
and Moderna earlier this month.
"I think we are on track for the timeline ... to start
getting this vaccine rolled out from December," Adrian Hill,
director of Oxford University's Jenner Institute that developed
the vaccine, told Reuters.
Britain has secured 100 million doses of the AstraZeneca
shot, 40 million of the Pfizer vaccine and 5 million of
Moderna's candidate.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has highlighted the
prospect of vaccines as a reason for optimism that things could
improve by spring after he introduced a second national lockdown
in England this month to tackle rising infections.
"Clearly the most hopeful advance of all is how vaccines are
now edging ever closer to liberating us from the virus,
demonstrating emphatically that this is not a pandemic without
end," he told parliament on Monday.
"We can take great heart from today's news, which has the
makings of a wonderful British scientific achievement."
AstraZeneca's interim results showed that a regimen of two
full doses was 62% effective in shielding people from COVID-19,
though the efficacy rate jumped to 90% if the first shot was
only half a normal dose.
Hill said high-risk groups would receive the AstraZeneca
vaccine before it was rolled out to everyone in spring.
"I think that could be done. It's going to be an enormous
effort ... hopefully there will be vaccine available for all
adults, but that's likely to be springtime rather than in
January," Hill said.
BACK TO NORMAL?
AstraZeneca executive Pam Cheng said there would be enough
supplies of the active ingredient in the vaccine to provide
Britain with 20 million doses by the end of the year and 70
million by the end of March.
She said that would translate into 4 million finished doses
this year and 40 million by the end of March. The vaccine is
also being manufactured by other AstraZeneca partners.
Britain's health minister has asked the health service to be
prepared to deliver vaccines from Dec. 1, although he said he
expects the bulk of the roll-out to happen next year.
"It's marvellous," said 59-year-old Jo Canilleri. "Hopefully
we won't take that long before we can actually get it, because
... a lot of people are just ignoring this. It's not a thing
that you can ignore. I mean look at the lives we've lost."
In Britain 55,000 people have died from COVID-19, the
highest death toll in Europe.
Britain expects to receive 10 million doses of the Pfizer
vaccine, which was 95% effective in trials, this year but the
fact it needs to be stored at minus 70 degrees Celsius could
pose logistical challenges for a mass roll-out.
Britain won't receive any Moderna vaccines, which were 94.5%
effective based on initial results, until next spring.
Andrew Pollard, director of the Oxford Vaccine Group and
chief investigator into the trial, said results released so far
showed vaccines could help protect against severe cases, which
in turn would help Britain's National Health Service (NHS).
"That, to me, means that, whichever of the vaccines we could
deploy we're likely to be able to prevent people going into
hospital clogging up, in this country, the NHS and allow us to
at least get that bit of the system back to normal," he told
Reuters.
(Reporting by Alistair Smout and Natalie Thomas; Additional
reporting by Kate Kelland; Editing by David Clarke)
