Wednesday January 27, 2021, 7:12 PM
European Commissioner for Health Stella Kyriakides said the EU is entitled to vaccines from UK factories. Credit: AP
The European Union is pushing to get access to Covid-19 vaccines manufactured in the UK amid a growing row with pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca.
The company partnered with Oxford University to deliver a vaccine, which is now the source of frustrations within the EU after AstraZeneca warned it would not be able to deliver as many jabs in the first quarter of the year as originally promised. UK factories are part of our advanced purchase agreement and that is why they have to deliver, EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides told a press conference on Wednesday.
The new Covid strains are more transmissible and potentially more lethal. Credit: ITV News
A rapid rise in infections in the UK at the end of 2020 was likely to have been fuelled by a variant of coronavirus thought to have originated in Kent.
It s one of multiple variants identified in the past few months, raising concerns about the effectiveness of vaccines manufactured to target the original variant.
So how do these news versions differ from the one we ve been living with for nearly a year and will the vaccine still protect us?
Here s what you need to know:
What variants have been identified in the UK and when?
The coronavirus pandemic has had political, economic and social consequences. Credit: PA/AP
Words by ITV News Multimedia Producer Wedaeli Chibelushi
One year ago, health authorities in China reported that a 61-year-old man in Wuhan had died from a “new type of coronavirus”.
The Wuhan Municipal Health Commission said the virus had infected 41 of their residents and left seven of them in a critical state. No one could pinpoint exactly what the virus was - but many feared an outbreak similar to that of SARS in 2008.
The mystery virus turned out to be much worse.
Covid-19, as we now know it, has killed more than 1,884,000 people worldwide and infected more than 86,400,000, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
The new variant emerged in the Eastern Cape.
A significant increase in infection rates in the UK is partly down to a new Covid-19 variant linked to South Africa which is more transmissable , according to the Chief Medical Officer for England, Professor Chris Whitty.
Here s what we know so far about the new strain in the UK.
Where has the variant come from and where has it spread in the UK?
Mr Hancock said that two cases of the new variant were first identified in the UK in December. Both are contacts of cases who have travelled from South Africa over the past few weeks, he said.