The British Government has purchased extra booster jabs to cover the next two years.
Ministers revealed they have signed deals for 114 million Moderna and Pfizer jabs which will be delivered in 2022 and 2023.
Business minister George Freeman, asked by Sky News why the UK was buying up more vaccines when developing countries had still not been vaccinated to a high degree, said: “It is a balance. We’ve got another variant.
“I think the British public would expect us to make sure that we’re providing the supply to those in the UK, which is why we’ve just procured another 114 million doses, precisely to be sure we can deliver that rollout here in the UK as well.
“This is a balance. We’ve got to make sure that our citizens are safe and that the global vaccine rollout through Covax is supported, and that’s what we’re committed to doing and that’s why today we’ve got, as part of that G7 follow-up, all the global leaders in vaccine science here in the UK at No 10 to make sure we are continuing to focus on it.
“It is an international challenge.”
Professor Adam Finn, a member of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), said it was unclear whether people will need to get Covid-19 booster shots every year.
He told BBC Breakfast: “It’s hard to say whether we’ll all need boosters indefinitely – it really does depend on how much further this virus can evolve.
“Just as with flu, the flu virus changes every year and we have to reformulate the vaccine and reimmunise people who are at risk.
“So, that could happen with coronavirus but whether it will require everybody to get boosters every year, well I think that’s really unclear at this point in time.”
