82-year-old Brian Pinker became the first person in the world to receive the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine this morning.
There was a hope among so many around the world that when 2020 became 2021, everything we have been faced with over the past year would magically disappear. Sadly, that isn't how it works. The COVID-19 outbreak continues and in some parts of the world it shows no signs of going away soon. There is hope though, and it comes in the form of a vaccine, or more specifically, two vaccines.
Millions around the world have already received the Pfizer vaccine over the course of the past two weeks. However, a new vaccine, the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, was approved in the UK last week and instills us with even more hope. The new vaccine is cheaper to produce and more importantly, it is a lot easier to store and transport than the Pfizer vaccine.
As was the case with the Pfizer vaccine, the first person to receive the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine was in the UK. Just a few hundred meters from where it was developed in Oxford, in fact. Brian Pinker, an 82-year-old kidney disease patient was the first in the world to receive the vaccine. Pinker said he is now looking forward to spending his 48th wedding anniversary with his wife next month.
The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine comes at a time when the COVID-19 outbreak is once again starting to worsen in the UK. A new strain, that appears to spread far more easily than the last, has emerged, forcing large parts of the country to effectively return to a full lockdown. The government has tweaked the way in which it will roll out the vaccines in light of this new development.
The initial aim was to issue both doses of the vaccine to the most vulnerable first. The second dose coming 21 days after the first. There will now be as long as a three-month gap between doses as the new aim is to now vaccinate as many people in as short a time as possible. 100 million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine have been ordered which will be enough to vaccinate most of the population.
Source: Sky News