Bloomberg: Another ray of hope for the people of the world as the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca Plc's vaccine against the novel coronavirus won the United Kingdom clearance. This marks the very first approval worldwide for a vaccine shot, which has faced a lot of questions and is a key to mass immunisations.
Early in 2021, the vaccine shot will be given to the most vulnerable group of people of the country, said the company and the government on Wednesday. After Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE's vaccine, this is the second coronavirus injection to be cleared by the UK for emergency use.
The homegrown shot of the UK has faced a lot of questions about its discrepancies in its clinical-trial results. The UK government has invested more in the product than in any other vaccine. It bought 100 million doses. However, what makes this shot more accessible for other countries as this vaccine shot can be deployed swiftly because it's is easier to transport and store as compared to the Pfizer-BioNTech one. This new vaccine shot does not require deep freezing but rather require only refrigerator temperatures for storing.
The first dose of this new shot will be given to as many people as possible. The second dose will be given within 12 weeks. An advisory group of the government said that it wants to quickly vaccinate as many people as possible.
The approval of the vaccine shot came after the UK sealed its divorce from the European Union with a trade deal and tightened the lockdowns.
The new mutant strain is being called the VUI-202012/01. This is the very first 'variant under investigation' in the UK. It has emerged in the UK in December 2020. Although the scientists are still on a hunt to find more information on the virus, the impact of the new strain can already be felt as many countries have imposed restrictions on travellers from the UK.the new strain of COVID-19 has originated in southeast England. The newly found strain is 70 per cent more transmissible than COVID-19. This has prompted the Indian government to suspend flights to and from the UK till December 31.
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