Shares in pharmaceutical companies fell sharply after the US government threw its weight behind global plans for a patent waiver on Covid-19 vaccines to boost their production and distribution around the world. Shortly after the US declared its support for the intellectual property (IP) waiver, which...
European leaders are lifting restrictions across a lockdown-weary bloc as they take what Italy’s prime minister, Mario Draghi, has admitted is a “calculated risk” that accelerating vaccination campaigns will keep stubbornly high infection rates in check. France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, will...
The UK currently has no plan to eliminate coronavirus from our shores. Lockdown will minimise contacts and protect the NHS. Rapid distribution of vaccines will protect the vulnerable, until all adults receive the vaccine in the longer term. Then we...
He made a great effort not to crow, but the Conservative minister could not contain his mix of pleasure and slight surprise this week. “If there is one thing that the Labour party absolutely does not want right now,” the minister...
The UK has sought to calm tensions in its row with the European Union over the supply of coronavirus vaccines, even offering to “help” the bloc with its current crisis. Just hours after the EU was forced to back down over incendiary plans...
From Monday, January 18, 10 new mass vaccination centres will open in England. The 10 new venues will join the seven mass vaccination centres already offering covid vaccines across the country. According to the Government’s coronavirus dashboard statistics, almost four million people...
Several countries in south-east Asia are expected to deploy the Chinese Sinovac vaccine despite concerns over its efficacy. Data released from a trial of the Sinovac jab in Brazil this week suggested its efficacy was 50.4% – lower than previously...
Germany and Denmark could follow the UK’s plan to delay giving a second dose of Covid-19 vaccine to people who have already received a first jab, as frustration at the slow progress of European inoculation programmes continues to mount. Britain said last...
Last week, the blighted state of large parts of the country fleetingly broke into the news. On Monday, the Legatum Institute thinktank reported that about 700,000 people in the UK had been pushed into poverty as a result of the coronavirus crisis,...
Hundreds of thousands of care home residents will miss out on the first wave of Covid vaccinations when the rollout begins next week, the government has admitted. The fragility of the newly licensed Pfizer vaccine means it will first be delivered only...
