United Kingdom will become the first country today to roll out the Covid-19 vaccine. As per the government, the shots will be initially available at hospitals before distributing stocks to doctors' clinics.

Britain gave emergency use approval for the vaccine developed by Pfizer and BioNTech last week. In a statement last week, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said that the government is doing everything to make sure to overcome significant challenges to vaccinate care home residents.

National Health Service is giving top priority to vaccinating those above 80 years, frontline healthcare workers and care home staff and residents. In total, Britain has ordered 4 crore doses. About 8 lakh doses are expected to be available within the first week.

Back home, Dr Harsh Vardan has confimed, In India, about 30 vaccines are in different stages of development. Two of them are in the most advanced stage of development - COVAXIN developed through ICMR-Bharat Biotech collaboration and COVISHIELD from the Serum Institute of India. Both are in the Phase-III clinical trial stage. Our premier institution – the Indian Council of Medical Research-is involved in their trial executions. India is also hosting clinical trials for all the major vaccine contenders. Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer, is conducting trials for the vaccine developed by Oxford University. ZydusCadila is also conducting Ph2 trialof an indigenous DNA Vaccine.One of our pharma giants, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, will distribute the Russian vaccine in India after conducting final-stage human trials and receiving regulatory approval”.