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10.02am BST
Moving vaccines from the UK to parts of the world which are still in crisis may even be a useful way to protect children in this country, Prof Adam Finn, of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, suggested
He told BBC Breakfast:
This is a global crisis and we do need to think globally and not just domestically. It may well be better for children in this country if vaccines are used to stop outbreaks like the massive outbreak in India which then get imported into this country and provide a threat to them and their schooling.”
I think we need to wait and see on that. It is not clear at this point whether we will actually need to vaccinate children in order to get that population immunity that we have to get.
People keep talking about ‘time to vaccinate the whole population’, but that is misguided. There’s going to be no vaccination of people under 18. It’s an adult-only vaccine, for people over 50, focusing on health workers and care home workers and the vulnerable.
We’re not fundamentally using the vaccine to create population immunity, we’re just changing the likelihood people will get harmed or hurt. It will be strategic.
9.52am BST
China reported 19 new Covid cases yesterday, up from 10 cases a day earlier, the country’s national health authority said.
Reuters reports:
The National Health Commission said that 18 of the new cases were imported infections. The number of new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, was 25, including one local case.
One new local infection was reported in Luan city in the eastern province of Anhui, local health authorities said. The patient was a close contact of a previous case and was under centralised quarantine since 13 May.
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