The United Kingdom, where new restrictions are expected, on Monday became the first country to administer the vaccine from the British laboratory AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford against Covid-19 to its population, while the controversy swells in France faced with the slowness of the vaccination campaign.
Brian Pinker, an 82-year-old Briton, received the first injection of the vaccine at Churchill Hospital at Oxford University, 520,000 doses of which are ready to be distributed in the United Kingdom.
“I am very happy to receive this Covid vaccine today and very proud that it was invented in Oxford,” he said.
While the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has already been injected to more than a million inhabitants in the United Kingdom since the beginning of December, the British authorities have ordered 100 million doses of that of AstraZeneca-Oxford, less expensive, easier to store and therefore more suitable for a large-scale immunization campaign.
The launch of this vaccine constitutes “a turning point in our fight against this horrible virus”, welcomed the Minister of Health Matt Hancock.
With more than 75,000 dead, the United Kingdom is one of the countries in Europe most bereaved by the coronavirus. Nearly 55,000 more people have tested positive for the virus in 24 hours, according to official data released on Sunday.
The rapid expansion of the epidemic, attributed to a new variant of the virus, has prompted British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to plan new restrictions, which will be announced as early as Monday evening.
“The Prime Minister is clear on the fact that new measures must now be taken. (…) He will announce them this evening”, indicated his spokesperson.
Scottish Prime Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced on Monday that Scotland would once again enter confinement “similar to that of March” 2020, to control the surge in contamination.
“From midnight and for the whole of January, you will be legally bound to stay at home,” she said.
– “Fiasco” –
If vaccination is accelerating across the Channel, in France, the controversy swells over the slowness of the campaign started eight days ago, which has so far only affected a few hundred people.
As of January 1, only 516 people had been vaccinated according to the Ministry of Health, much less than in Germany, where more than 200,000 vaccinations have been recorded.
The president of the Grand Est region, where the epidemic situation is particularly alarming, denounced Monday “a state scandal”.
Ecologist MEP Yannick Jadot criticized the “fiasco” of the French vaccine strategy, and several eminent doctors were also worried about a start that was much too slow in their eyes.
As a sign of concern, the Elysee Palace announced the holding of a “working and monitoring meeting” on vaccination Monday afternoon with President Emmanuel Macron, Prime Minister Jean Castex and several ministers, and the government has moved forward this Monday the start of vaccination for caregivers.
The vaccination campaign began on the weekend of 26-27 December in most EU countries, after the green light for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, but the slowness of the process is also drawing criticism at European level.
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) announced Monday that it could pronounce on the Moderna vaccine during the day, instead of Wednesday as initially planned.
The European Commission has, for its part, indicated that it is negotiating an order for additional doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, in addition to the 300 million already approved, defending itself against criticism that the EU has not ordered enough doses of this vaccine. vaccine.
A spokesperson argued for Brussels’ choice not to put “all its eggs in one basket”, by concluding contracts with six pharmaceutical manufacturers.
– Massive vaccination in Beijing –
If the arrival of vaccines gives hope for an improvement at the start of the year, production and supply rates are still far from satisfactory.
In the United States, the vaccination campaign is gaining momentum and could reach one million injections per day, officials assured Sunday in the face of criticism of its initial delay, in a country which has just crossed the mark of 350,000 dead.
In China, thousands of Beijingers lined up on Monday to receive a Covid-19 vaccine ahead of the Chinese New Year trips, as authorities sought at all costs to avoid a new epidemic wave.
In the capital alone, more than 73,000 people received a first dose of the vaccine between Friday and Sunday, the press reported.
In Japan, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced Monday that his government “was considering” a new state of emergency in the greater Tokyo region in the face of increased contamination.
Describing the country’s health situation as “very severe”, he said he hoped that the vaccination campaign could begin at the end of February, adding that he would be among the first to receive the injection.
The pandemic has killed more than 1.84 million people worldwide and 85 million cases of infection, according to a report established Monday by AFP.
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