Analysis: being first country in the world to license a jab for the virus is also fraught with unknown pitfalls
The obvious joy and excitement over the UK’s approval of a vaccine against Covid, opening a way out of the pandemic, had barely begun to abate before questions started to arise over the speed with which the UK appeared to have stolen a march on the rest of the western world.
The health secretary saw this as a triumph for Britannia. Matt Hancock even tried to spin it as a triumph for Brexit. The UK had elected not to follow the cumbersome processes of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), which has said it will decide on a licence for the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine by 29 December. Instead, said Hancock, the government had passed special regulations so that the UK regulator could go it alone, with fantastic results. Many British arms will be jabbed before the EMA has come to a decision.
