Britain on Monday was taking another giant step in the fight against COVID-19, ramping up its immunization program by giving shots from the vaccine created by Oxford University and pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca.
Since Dec. 8, Britain's National Health Service has been giving out shots from a vaccine made by Pfizer and the German firm BioNTech to health care workers and nursing home residents and staff. On Monday, it boosts that arsenal with inoculations with the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, which is cheaper and easier to use, since it does not require the super-cold storage needed by the Pfizer vaccine.
Officials say the U.K. has around 530,000 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine on hand and is moving toward a goal of vaccinating 2 million people a week as soon as possible.