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- The U.K. government has formally asked the nation’s regulatory body to assess the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for approval
- The news comes after Pfizer submit the vaccine to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorisation
- More than 20,000 new cases of the virus are being reported in the U.K. each day, with total cases currently sitting at just under 1.5 million
- While the U.S. government has said the FDA’s assessment could take a matter of weeks, the U.K. has not given a timeframe for its own approval process
Britain’s health minister Matt Hancock has formally asked the nation’s regulatory body to assess the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for approval.
Earlier this week, Pfizer became the first pharmaceutical company to successfully submit a COVID-19 vaccine candidate to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorisation.
The vaccine is purported to be around 95 per cent effective, based on the results of late-stage trial. If approval is granted by the FDA, the U.S. could begin distributing the vaccine as early as mid-December.
With new daily cases of COVID-19 also increasing across the Atlantic, the U.K. health minister said the formal request was an important step forward in handling the pandemic.
“If a vaccine is approved it will, of course, be available across the U.K. from our National Health Service, free at the point of delivery, according to need, not ability to pay,” Hancock added.
Like much of Europe, the U.K. is currently facing a second, more severe wave of the virus, compared to its original spike in cases back in April.
More than 20,000 new cases of the virus are being reported across the U.K. each day, with the total cases currently sitting at just under 1.5 million.
Despite the Prime Minister Boris Johnson first appearing hesitant to once again instigate widespread measures to combat the virus’s spread, the U.K. recently re-entered a lockdown-like level of restrictions.
Under the current measures, all non-essential shops and entertainment venues have closed, household mixing is forbidden, and all dine-in restaurants and pubs are barred from taking customers.
While the FDA approval could take a matter of weeks, the U.K. government did not give an expected timeframe for its own regulatory approval. When pressed for an estimate, England’s deputy chief medical officer Van Tam simply said the regulator would work “at the speed of science.”
