Covid vaccine 'could be rolled out NEXT MONTH': Leaked NHS documents reveal plan for 'tens of thousands of Britons to get the jab every day by Christmas'
Covid vaccination jabs are expected to be on offer by the NHS from as early as next month, as five mass vaccination centres are planned to be in action by Christmas.
Leaked provisional documents have revealed the plan for hundreds of NHS staff to be deployed in five sites across the country - injecting tens of thousands of the public each day, reports The Sun.
Those most vulnerable to coronavirus will be called up first, with centres manned by trainee nurses and paramedics planned for Leeds, Hull and London, the publication reports.
In addition to the five static sites of giant scale, GPs and pharmacists will be asked to assist in the mass vaccination effort, with a fleet of mobile units to be used to reach vulnerable communities and those in care homes.
NHS staff handing out test kits to Glasgow University students as they arrive for testing at a pop up test centre in Glasgow. October 3, 2020
A source told The Sun: 'The earliest we are likely to get the first trial results is in a month's time - which means the best case scenario for a potential roll out is just before Christmas.
'But planning is well under way, so there will be no delay in vaccination once we have a working jab.'
Provisional plans state the end of this month as the vaccine roll out date, but without approval from UK regulators and the European Medicines Agency to administer the vaccination the schedule is unlikely to stand fast.
On Sunday Matt Hancock confirmed that the military would be involved in distributing a coronavirus vaccine.
Matt Hancock (pictured last month) confirmed on Sunday that the military would be involved in distributing a coronavirus vaccine
The Health Secretary told the virtual Tory conference that 'the plans are in train' to combine the NHS and the armed forces to make 'the rollout happen'.
Care home residents and staff will be first to get a Covid-19 vaccine ahead of NHS staff and all over-80s
Care home residents and staff will be the first to get a Covid-19 vaccine when one is approved, according to fresh government advice.
Everyone over the age of 80 and NHS staff will be second in line, updated guidance from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation states.
The body, which consists of 20 top scientists, advises ministers on all vaccines. It admitted its guidance for any UK Covid-19 vaccination scheme is likely to change in the future.
Matt Hancock previously pledged that Britons with underlying conditions would be near the front of the queue for any jab. But millions living with heart disease or other ailments that raise their risk of dying of Covid-19 won't be vaccinated until everyone over the age of 65 is inoculated, according to the new guidance.
WHO WILL GET A COVID-19 JAB FIRST?
Under the proposed ranking by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, the vaccines will be rolled out in the following order:
He said people would get the vaccine 'according to priority' - but did not clarify what that order would be.
Mr Hancock told the Tory conference that a vaccine was the 'great hope'.
The leading contender in the race to find a vaccine is Oxford University, where trials have been ongoing since April - there are hopes the vaccine could be approved by regulators by Christmas.
Around 100million doses of the Oxford vaccination, which is yet to be proved successful, have already been ordered by the Government.
The jabs developed by Oxford University require two inoculations, 28 days apart, meaning the logistical challenge faced by the government is two fold.
To administer two doses of a vaccine to 53 million adults in the six-month time period would involve 600,000 jabs a day.
The proposals, leaked to The Sun, also suggested that health workers including vets, dieticians and chiropodists could also help administer the doses to the public if regulations are relaxed to allow it.
Those who need the injections most are first on the list, meaning care home residents and staff will get it as soon as it's ready.
Those aged over 80 and NHS staff are next, followed by all over 65s, younger adults at higher risk and people over 50.
Some care home managers were asked for a list of eligible frontline staff last month.
On Monday the head of the country's vaccine task-force Kate Bingham stated that less than half of Britain will get vaccinated against Covid-19.
She claimed ministers are hoping around 30million people will receive the potentially life-saving jab, out of a total of almost 67million.
Ms Bingham said: 'We just need to vaccinate everyone at risk', revealing that no-one under the age of 18 will receive a dose.
Last week a Royal Society report warned there would be significant challenges in distributing and producing the vaccine on such a mass scale.
Nilay Shah, head of the department of chemical engineering at Imperial College London, and a co-author of the report, said: 'Even when the vaccine is available it doesn't mean within a month everybody is going to be vaccinated.
'We're talking about six months, nine months . . . a year. There's not a question of life suddenly returning to normal in March.'
Yesterday WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus revealed that he anticipated a vaccine against COVID-19 may be ready by the year-end.
Tens of thousands could be vaccinated each day according to leaked documents
Dr Ghebreyesus said in final remarks to the WHO's Executive Board, without elaborating: 'We will need vaccines and there is hope that by the end of this year we may have a vaccine. There is hope.'
Nine experimental vaccines are in the pipeline of the WHO's COVAX global vaccine facility that aims to distribute 2 billion doses by the end of 2021.
Kate Bingham, head of the country's vaccine task-force said less than half of the UK population will get a coronavirus vaccine
Britain is currently bound by the European Medicines Agency until January, meaning it can't administer the drug even if approved by UK regulators.
But Ministers have revealed plans to change the law to allow vaccinations to start sooner.
The Department of Health said: 'We are confident we have adequate provision or transport, PPE and logistical expertise to deploy a Covid-19 vaccine across the country as quickly as possible.'
Several challenges had been highlighted in the Royal Society report, including the need to inject people with RNA, a type of genetic material, in some of the most promising studies, even though an RNA vaccine has never been produced at a large scale.
Questions also remain over supply chains, with some vaccines having to be kept at -80C while being transported.
Furthermore, as much as 80 per cent of the population may have to be innoculated to achieve herd immunity, even if a vaccine proves to be 90 per cent effective in reducing transmission.
Five vaccination centres are listed in the provisional plans, including locations in Leeds, Hull and London
Another contender in the race to vaccinate the world is New York-based company Codagenix, who plans to begin experiments of its vaccine in London by the end of the year.
The jab will be of a type called a live attenuated vaccine, meaning people will be given a genetically-modified version of the coronavirus that is weaker than the real thing but still infectious.
Live attenuated vaccines — such as the MMR jab — work by stimulating the immune system in the same way that real Covid-19 would, but by relying on viruses unable to cause severe illness.
Codagenix says its vaccine was successful after a single dose in animal trials and is designed to produce immunity against various parts of the coronavirus, rather than just the 'spike protein' on the outside that many others have focused on.
This could mean it would still work even if the virus mutated. Using a live virus may enable medics to create a type of immunity that is similar to what the body would make naturally.
For now the UK is now well and truly in the midst of a second wave, with 6,000 new cases every day and hospital admissions doubling every week.