more than 10 million people across the
uk have now received at least one
vaccination for coronavirus
as part of the biggest program of its
kind in the history of the nhs
it's a major milestone in the race to
control the faster spreading variance
of the virus ministers are hoping to
avoid yet another lockdown
by protecting the most vulnerable groups
and the plan is
to offer vaccines to 15 million people
those aged 70 and over health care
workers
people who need to shield by mid
february in the meantime
experts say that the number of deaths
will remain significant
as infection levels they say are still
alarmingly high
our political editor laura kunsberg has
the latest
sleeves up syringes ready
vaccine in army medics filling this
church hole in chingford
but they used to be bingo nights and dog
training
they'd done 400 by lunchtime no hanging
about
obviously a lot of people are shocked
that we're here but then they're also so
thankful that we're here and it's just
nice to be
to just feel like appreciated they've
literally come out of their house just
for this vaccination
and they've literally turned around and
said look we can't thank you enough and
i can't
tell you how much that resonates with
each and every one of us now the whole
country
has hit the 10 million mark we have
today passed the milestone
of 10 million vaccinations in the united
kingdom
including almost 90 percent of those
aged 75
and over in england whether a church
hall a town hall
a temple or a car park at a leisure
center
there are more and more places right
around the country where the vaccine is
on
offer helping to loosen the grip the
pandemic has had on our country for
such a long time but the vaccine program
astonishing though it is is not a root
out on its own
are you sure the vaccines work on all
the variants prime minister
he's accused of leaving a gap where more
dangerous versions of the disease could
creep in
boris johnson promised travellers
arriving from 30 at-risk countries
would have to stay in hotels at airports
for 10 days
but there's no date for when that will
start and labor wants every country on
the list
with new variants in the country our
schools are shut
and our borders are open 21 000 people
are coming into this country
every day the prime minister's new
border arrangements are still weeks away
from being implemented
this queue in a london suburb isn't for
the vaccine
but extra testing to clamp down on the
new variant of the disease from south
africa that's already here
and the government admitted today at
least 20 000 people instructed to
isolate with the disease aren't doing so
therese came out for the first time for
many months for her vaccine
but understands why others might break
the rules there are people still going
to work because they need the money
they're not doing it to deliberately see
i don't care
and in lockdown 28 year old nish has
become the breadwinner
but he reckons it's hard to force people
to stay at home i think the majority of
people will not self-isolate because
of lockdown fatigue and
and also i'd say not clear messaging
from the government was it clear today
can you give a firm
date for when hotel quarantine will
start and will you offer
more help for people who just can't
afford to isolate
if not aren't you leaving two big holes
in our defenses
we have among the toughest border
regimes now anywhere in the world we're
restricting as much as we can
any risk of importing uh new infection
into this
into this country without totally
secluding the uk
economy with nhs tests and traces
reaching uh 90
of contacts and and the vast majority of
them
are doing the right thing the prime
minister did confirm he wants england at
least to leave lockdown as one
even if the rest of the uk might follow
different timetables but while there's
jubilation at the vaccine
there are still obstacles ahead it's too
early to take a break
laura kunsberg bbc news
now the pharma giant astrazeneca and
oxford university
say they plan to have a next-generation
covid vaccine ready for the autumn
the new jab will help to give people
protection against some of the latest
variants discovered recently
the health secretary matt hancock said
the latest research
indicating that the oxford astrozenica
vaccine
might reduce the spread of the virus was
superb news
our medical editor fergus walsh has more
details
the scientists at oxford who created the
astrazeneca vaccine
are continually monitoring how
coronavirus is
evolving the current vaccine is thought
to give
good protection against new variants
but they're working on tweaking the jab
to make it future proof
the scientist who's leading the research
says it's relatively simple
to redesign the vaccine it's not
difficult to put a different
antigenic insert into the vaccine so we
don't want to
panic and uh say that we or we must have
a new version of the vaccine now but on
the other hand
we are getting prepared so that if it
turns out we need
do need a new version it will be ready
to start using it
so it's just going to be a sharp scratch
those on the oxford vaccine trials
were shown to have 76 protection from a
single dose
which lasted three months rising to 82
protection with the second shot you'll
be doing swabs every week at home
it's also the first time a covid vaccine
has been shown to reduce
transmission of coronavirus those
immunized were much less likely to
test positive for infection cutting the
risk of them
passing the virus onto others that's the
vaccine but what about those
who've actually had covid they want to
know how long they may be protected
against subsequent infection a study
involving
nearly twenty thousand volunteers may
provide at least part of the answer
like the other participants i was asked
to send off a few drops of my blood
every month to a lab scientist at uk
biobank found that
88 of participants nearly nine in ten
who started off with antibodies still
had them
six months later i think these findings
are really good news because it does
suggest
that people who have been infected with
the virus may have some degree of
protection
against another infection for some
considerable time
i think what we'd really like to know
next is
um how long does this doesn't this
natural immunity
last for beyond six months scientists
think
vaccines are likely to offer much
stronger protection
than natural infection so a key message
is to get
immunized even if you've already had
kobit
to boost your immunity and maybe protect
others fergus bbc news
so let's take a look then at the latest
official figures they show a continuing
fall
in new cases of coronavirus there were
19
202 new infections recorded in the
latest 24-hour period
which means that on average the number
of new cases reported per day in the
past week
is 22 390
across the uk an average of 32 851
people
were in hospital with coronavirus over
the seven days to monday
including suspected cases in wales
1322 deaths were reported thus people
who died within 28 days
of a positive covet test and on average
in the past week
1064 deaths were announced every day
total number of deaths so far across the
uk is a hundred and nine thousand
three hundred and thirty-five and let's
look
at the vaccination rollout now then just
these figures
three hundred and seventy four thousand
seven hundred and fifty six people
have had their first dose of one of the
three approved vaccines
in the latest 24-hour period and as
we've heard that takes the overall
number of people who've had their first
job
to 10 million and 21 471.
let's have a word tonight again with our
health editor hugh pim
lots of people looking at these very
impressive vaccination figures here and
then wondering well
does that mean there's a change of
calculation around when lockdown might
be eased
well there's certainly a more optimistic
tone to this media briefing than some
we've seen
in recent weeks the prime minister
talked about signs of
hope although infection levels he said
were very high
and professor chris whittie the uk
government's chief medical adviser
went further than before to say we were
past the peak
of this recent surge he said all the key
numbers on the graphs were coming down
that's case numbers
numbers in hospitals and deaths so the
questions were being asked at the
briefing what did this mean
for restrictions but the prime minister
was sticking very much to his previous
line which is that you need to get all
the key priority groups the top four
groups
70s and over vaccinated by the middle of
this month and then wait
three weeks till full immunity had been
built up for as much as possible to be
absolutely certain and only then on
march the 8th to open up schools
in england and possibly consider other
restrictions being used as well and
that's even though scotland's indicated
it'll start opening up schools later
this month
and the welsh government is considering
it as well so sticking to that pretty
cautious line
and one clue was given by chris whittie
when asked
why this was being uh adopted this sort
of line he said
with all these variants it only takes
cases to go up a bit
for the nhs to get into trouble very
quickly again hugh manny thanks once
again
hugh pim i have 32.