UK to expand Covid booster jab campaign to all adults

The UK’s Covid booster programme will be expanded to all adults and the gap between second and third vaccine jabs halved to three months, the government said on Monday as the number of confirmed cases involving the new Omicron variant increased to 11.

Sajid Javid, health secretary, said ministers would also accept the recommendation of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) that 12 to 15-year-olds should be given a second dose of a Covid vaccine 12 weeks after their first jab.

People who are severely immunocompromised should also be offered a further booster, which would mark their fourth dose, while the gap between the second and third jabs should be halved from six months to three, the body added.

“The latest indication is that [the new variant] spreads very rapidly, it may impact the effectiveness of one of our major treatments for Covid-19 . . . and as the chief medical officer said this weekend there is a reasonable chance that our current vaccines may be impacted,” Javid told the House of Commons.

“In the race between the vaccines and the virus, the new variant may have given the virus extra legs,” he added. “Our strategy is to buy ourselves time and to strengthen our defences while our world leading scientists learn more about this potential threat.”

Javid’s announcement follows growing concern among politicians and scientists over the global spread of the Omicron variant, first identified in South Africa. The Scottish government on Monday confirmed that six Omicron cases had been identified in Lanarkshire, Greater Glasgow and Clyde.

“With any vaccine during a pandemic we get the greater benefit of the vaccine for individuals and society if the vaccine is deployed before the wave starts,” said Professor Wei Shen Lim, JCVI Covid chair, adding that while he was not predicting that Omicron would spark a new wave of infections, scientists were keen to act sooner rather than later.

Jonathan Van Tam, England’s deputy chief medical officer, said that many unknowns remained with regard to the new variant but added: “The number of mutations present already on first principle makes us worry about a possible effect on vaccine effectiveness.”

The UK will be the first nation to cut the gap between a second dose and a booster shot to three months.

Israel, the first country to greenlight a booster campaign, has a five-month wait, while US and EU citizens, who received either a BioNTech/Pfizer or a Moderna shot have to wait six months. In the US, however, people who were given the Johnson & Johnson single-shot coronavirus jab are eligible for a booster after just two months.

In the Pfizer booster trial, which proved that a third dose is 95.6 per cent effective against stopping symptomatic infection, the median gap between second and third doses was 11 months. The Pfizer shot is the linchpin of the UK booster rollout.

Danny Altmann, professor of immunology at Imperial College London, welcomed the move, praising the JCVI for being “pragmatic” and “not overly risk-averse”.

“Six months may be slightly more effective than three months, but if the choice is between being boosted or unboosted before Omicron arrives, you’d choose boosted every time,” he said.

“People imagine that there is some great immunological tome of knowledge about the length of wait time, but really we are racing to work out the rules as we go along. Flexibility is key.”

New coronavirus measures are due to take effect in England from 4am on Tuesday, with the public required to wear face coverings while travelling on public transport and while in retail settings such as supermarkets and hairdressers.

Individuals travelling into the UK, regardless of their vaccination status, must take a day 2 PCR test and self isolate until they have a negative test result. The government will review the measures in three weeks’ time.

The UK has placed 10 African countries on its red list, including South Africa, Zambia and Mozambique. All UK and Irish residents travelling back into the UK from the selected countries will be required to undertake 10 days’ hotel quarantine, while non residents will not be permitted to enter the country.

One senior Tory MP who has opposed previous lockdowns said the measures did not seem disproportionate or illiberal at face value. “Assuming the regulations stack up to what the government said then I think at the moment it seems reasonably proportionate, there is nothing that is economically massively costly. I’m not going to get into a terrible flap about this.”

Earlier on Monday, Javid convened a meeting with fellow health ministers from the G7 group of developed economies to discuss how best to tackle the rapidly spreading variant.