Powerscourt Coronavirus Briefing – 04 December 2020

The first vaccines against Covid-19 have arrived in the UK, and collided head-on with an outbreak of medical one-upmanship.

The UK became the first western country to approve a vaccine against the virus earlier this week, which the British government hailed as a world-beating national achievement.  Education secretary Gavin Williamson claimed it was possible because Britain “has better scientists and regulators, and is just a better country, than Belgium, France or the US.”

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) move raised eyebrows among fellow regulators, and British bragging got on European and indeed American nerves.  Anthony Fauci, the top US infectious diseases expert, queried whether the UK regulator had cut corners and said the US Food and Drug Administration was the “gold standard” for drug regulation globally.  An EU spokesman said: “This is not a football competition.”

Fauci backtracked overnight and said he did not doubt the skills of the MHRA.  “We do things differently, that’s all – not better, not worse, just differently,” he told the BBC.  Later he was asked by president-elect Joe Biden to be the incoming administration’s chief medical officer, the New York Times reported. (Dr Fauci will be 80 on Christmas Eve and is two years older than Biden, proof that age discrimination is not an issue).

EU health ministers came under pressure to explain why the MHRA could move quickly while the European Medicines Agency is unlikely to approve the vaccine – developed by Pfizer and BioNTech – until nearer to Christmas.  Jens Spahn, Germany’s health minister, said:  “The idea is not to be first but to have a safe and efficient vaccine.”  Stephen Donnelly, his Irish counterpart, told RTE: “The UK has eminent scientists and regulators and it is OK for the UK to do it that way, but the EMA is approaching this very professionally.”

As we noted yesterday, the EU is predicted to be four months behind the US and two months behind the UK in completing widespread immunisation.

June Raine, the MHRA’s boss, is to conduct a round of interviews on local and regional media on Friday to reassure the country that the vaccine is safe, the Times reports.

Professor Stephen Evans, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said one reason the MHRA could be first to approve the vaccine was that it had more capacity and time since it was no longer involved in EU-wide drug approval because of Brexit.  Any errors in approving the vaccine would seriously damage the UK regulator’s reputation and “there is a huge incentive to get this right,” he said.

The vaccine nationalism coincided with some grim new milestones.  The UK death toll climbed over 60,000, the number of people in hospital in the US rose above 100,000, and the number of deaths globally is now over 1.5 million.  Italy on Wednesday recorded the highest daily death toll since the outbreak of the pandemic and has banned travel from region to region from December 20 to January 6.  “It’s an essential caution to protect our loved ones,” said prime minister Giuseppe Conte.

In the US, Biden said he would ask all Americans to wear masks for 100 days to contain the spread of the virus.  Former presidents Barack Obama, George W Bush and Bill Clinton are willing to be vaccinated live on TV to reassure a sceptical and even hostile US public that vaccines are safe, according to CNN.

Equity markets are strong thanks to vaccines and hopes of US stimulus.

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