The countries first in line to get UK’s spare Covid vaccines
Ireland expected to front the queue as Downing Street how to share out excess jabs
Boris Johnson’s government will prioritise Ireland when handing out excess Covid vaccines once enough stocks have been secured for the UK’s jabs campaign, insider sources says.
Data from the North Carolina-based Duke Global Health Innovation Center shows that the UK has ordered a total of 367 million doses of Covid vaccines from seven developers - enough for 5.5 jabs per person.
The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, which accounts for 100 million of the order, has been approved for use in the UK, but some of the other jabs set to bump up the nation’s stocks, including Valneva, Novavax and Janssen, have not yet got the green light from regulators.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
However, a ministerial source told The Telegraph that ministers are already examining ways “to protect us and the rest of the world” by sharing doses as soon as adequate supplies for the domestic vaccination programme are assured.
If Ireland was “still experiencing shortfalls” at that stage, the government “absolutely would” hand over coronavirus vaccines to its nearest neighbour, the source said.
According to insiders, Ireland will top the jabs handout list because the Republic shares a land border with Northern Ireland, and the island as a whole is expected to be viewed by the government as a “single epidemiological unit” for the purpose of health.
Amid speculation about which other countries could get the UK’s excess jabs, a government source told Politico’s London Playbook that the view inside Downing Street is that “we have a humanitarian responsibility to help developing countries access vaccines”.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
“It may well be the case in the coming months that we need to assist our friends in the EU as well,” the source said.
Secretary of State for International Trade Liz Truss yesterday told Sky News’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday that it “could well be the case” that vaccines are sent from the UK to the EU or developing countries before all adults in the UK have been vaccinated.
“It’s a bit too early to say how we would deploy vaccines, but we certainly want to work with friends and neighbours, we want to work with developing countries,” she added.
The government is arguing that only a global vaccination drive will be enough to bring the pandemic to an end. Speaking at a People’s PMQs event filmed on Sunday, the prime minister said that “the vaccination of everybody in the world… is ultimately the only way to fix this”.
His comments came as a spokesperson for the World Health Organization said that it was morally and economically “the right thing to do” for the UK to help efforts elsewhere after vaccinating top priority groups at home.
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i new site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.
-
Nigeria's worsening rate of maternal mortality
Under the radar Economic crisis is making hospitals unaffordable, with women increasingly not receiving the care they need
By Harriet Marsden, The Week UK Published
-
'Elevating Earth Day into a national holiday is not radical — it's practical'
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
By Harold Maass, The Week US Published
-
UAW scores historic win in South at VW plant
Speed Read Volkswagen workers in Tennessee have voted to join the United Auto Workers union
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Covid four years on: have we got over the pandemic?
Today's Big Question Brits suffering from both lockdown nostalgia and collective trauma that refuses to go away
By Chas Newkey-Burden, The Week UK Published
-
The hollow classroom
Opinion Remote school let kids down. It will take much more than extra tutoring for kids to recover.
By Mark Gimein Published
-
Excess screen time is making children only see what is in front of them
Under the radar The future is looking blurry. And very nearsighted.
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published
-
Covid-19: what to know about UK's new Juno and Pirola variants
in depth Rapidly spreading new JN.1 strain is 'yet another reminder that the pandemic is far from over'
By Arion McNicoll, The Week UK Published
-
Long-term respiratory illness is here to stay
The Explainer Covid is not the only disease with a long version
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published
-
Covid inquiry: the most important questions for Boris Johnson
Talking Point Former PM has faced weeks of heavy criticism from former colleagues at the public hearing
By The Week Staff Published
-
China's pneumonia cases: should we be worried?
The Explainer Experts warn against pushing 'pandemic panic button' following outbreak of respiratory illness
By Keumars Afifi-Sabet, The Week UK Published
-
Vallance diaries: Boris Johnson 'bamboozled' by Covid science
Speed Read Then PM struggled to get his head around key terms and stats, chief scientific advisor claims
By The Week UK Published