The COVID-19 vaccine developed by AstraZeneca could be approved “shortly after” Christmas, according to Oxford University’s Professor of Regius Medicine, raising hopes for millions of people and businesses with the disease spread across the country.
John Bell told BBC Radio 4’s Today program that he expected the British medical regulator to give the green light to the experimental image that AstraZeneca AZN was doing together
and Oxford University, “very quickly.”
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency has obtained “multiple datasets” about the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine candidate, Bell told the BBC, adding that he had “no concerns that the data looks better than it always was. ”
“I doubt we’ll do Christmas now, but I would expect it just after Christmas,” Bell said.
Shares in AstraZeneca AZN,
which has risen more than 4% so far this year, trading 0.57% lower in London on Wednesday.
Read: AstraZeneca – Oxford COVID bullet ‘safe and effective,’ shows full test data
Data from the late trials of AstraZeneca in the UK and Brazil, published in the medical journal The Lancet on December 9, showed that the vaccine candidate had a 62% efficacy for test participants who received two full doses, only 90% for a smaller subgroup of a group taken in half, then a full dose.
The UK government has ordered 100 million doses of AstraZeneca and Oxford design, with 40 million doses available by the end of March 2021.
An agreement would help accelerate vaccinations across the country as it tackles a variant of the potentially 70% more contagious version of the coronavirus that is thought to be behind a spike recently in COVID-19 cases in London and the South East of England.
Read: The new Covid-19 strain is shining down in Europe. What you need to know.
Since Sunday, more than 40 countries have closed their borders to UK arrivals to prevent the spread of the new strain. However, late Tuesday, France opened its borders with the UK to passengers and truck drivers who show confirmation of a negative coronavirus test within the last 72 hours.
AstraZeneca told Reuters Tuesday that its vaccine candidate should be effective against the new strain of coronavirus variant and said studies were underway to investigate the impact of the change.
“AZD1222 (AstraZeneca vaccine candidate) contains the SARS-CoV-2 virus spike protein genetic material, and the changes to the genetic code seen in this new viral strain do not appear. changing the structure of the spike protein, ”the AstraZeneca spokesman told the news agency.
Read: BioNTech chief says more tests are needed to see if vaccine protects against new COVID-19 strain
AstraZeneca’s comments come after BioNTech head BNTX,
said the German company’s vaccine, developed by US partner Pfizer PFE,
further testing was needed to determine whether the design would be able to provide protection against the new variant.
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is already in use in the US, UK, Canada and several other countries. It was agreed by the European Medicines Authority and the European Commission on Tuesday, and delivery is expected to begin on Saturday. Germany, Austria and Italy are among those countries that have said they plan to start vaccinations from Sunday.