More than half of people in UK have had first jab

MORE than half the UK population has now received at least one jab against coronavirus, it was declared yesterday.

NHS data up to April 23 shows that of the 45,580,400 jabs given in the UK so far, 33,508,590 were first doses – a rise of 119,953 on the previous day.

The UK population is estimated to be 66,796,807, so the latest figures show that more than half the population have now had a first dose of a coronavirus vaccine.

Anyone aged 45 and over can still arrange their jab in England, as well as people who are clinically vulnerable or health and care workers.

Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, said: “It is an astonishing achievement that half of the UK population has now had at least one Covid-19 jab.

“In under five months, frontline NHS staff in trusts and primary care and volunteers have done a really incredible job giving out over 33 million first jabs and more than 12 million second doses.

“We owe each and every one of them our thanks.

“We’ve made truly significant progress, but we’ve still got a long way to go until we reach our next major milestone of offering all adults their first jab by the end of July.”

Experts have said vaccines should be able to control the pandemic as they published new real-world UK data showing that jabs reduce infection and are likely to cut transmission.

Just one dose of either the PfizerBioNTech or Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccination leads to a two thirds drop in coronavirus cases and is shown to be 74 per cent effective against symptomatic infection.

After two doses of Pfizer, there was a 70 per cent reduction in all cases and a 90 per cent drop in symptomatic cases, who are the people most likely to transmit coronavirus to others.

Experts are still collecting the data on the effect of two doses of AstraZeneca but say their findings show that both vaccines work and are effective in the real world.

One of the new studies, which has yet to be peer-reviewed, is based on data from the national Covid-19 Infection Survey run by the University of Oxford and the Office for National Statistics.

It included a random sample of more than 373,000 adults from across the UK, who produced more than 1.6 million swab test results between December and April.