Afternoon summary
That’s all from me for today.
Coverage continues on our global coronavirus live blog.
Updated
Photograph: Reuters
Speaking at a webinar organised by the Science Media Centre, Prof Adrian Hill, director of the Jenner Institute for Vaccine Research at Oxford University, said the early success of the Oxford vaccine was good news for other teams trying to develop a Covid-19 vaccine around the world. He said:
The good news is that these vaccines that are in development - 23 of them now - fall into groups. If our vaccine works it is much more likely that another adenoviral vaccine would work as well ...
It is perhaps a little scientifically unlikely that one vaccine would be perfect and all the others would fail, so if one worked well, similar vaccines have a good chance of working.
He also said was very unlikely that any immunity to Covid-19 provided by the vaccine would only be short-term. He explained:
Making the assumption that if natural infection doesn’t give you immunity for very long, therefore a vaccine won’t give you immunity for very long - that doesn’t follow.
What matters is the type of vaccine technology you are using.
The other upbeat response is that there aren’t really vaccines out there that just last for a few months - by and large vaccines last for some years, or at least a year and then you might need a top-up. [Immunity] is not going to disappear very quickly.
At the webinar Prof Andrew Pollard, of the Oxford Vaccine Group, said it was impossible to say yet how many shots of the vaccine each age group would need to be given to gain and then maintain levels of coronavirus immunity. He said:
We have seen encouraging response with one dose.
But in the small subgroup that you see in the Lancet paper, there are better responses with two doses - that is not totally unexpected.
We know that human populations are completely naive to this virus and so you need quite a heavy lift in order to get a really good immune response from this vaccine, which is what we are trying to achieve with the two-dose schedule.
And Prof Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at Oxford University, told the webinar why scientists were trying to stimulate both antibodies and a T-cell response through a Covid-19 vaccine. She said:
Antibodies are in fluids in the body and they can encounter viruses when they first come into the body.
Antibodies can bind on to the outside of the virus to stop them infecting cells - so that’s what we mean by neutralising antibodies.
It sees the virus, attaches to it as soon as it comes into the body and stops it causing any infection.
T-cells can recognise which cells have the virus inside them and destroy them to prevent further spread of the virus in the body.
The two systems working together are completely complementary, first of all stopping infection coming in, and if [the virus] does get past the antibodies, [T-cells] destroy the cells that the virus has taken over.
Updated
Pascal Soriot, CEO of AstraZeneca, which is working with Oxford University on its coronavirus vaccine, has said the firm will start mass-producing it before it has been approved for use, so as to be sure that if it does get approved, it can be distributed quickly. He told reporters:
The only way to be ready to distribute the vaccine shortly after we get the results is to manufacture in parallel to doing the clinical development. So we’re basically starting the manufacturing process in parallel to running the clinical trials.
The question of when we’ll be able to distribute is a function of mostly, in fact, the infection rate in the community - therefore how quickly we can show efficacy. And then it will be in the hands of the regulators to review the data in their various geographies.
Our hope is that we can actually start delivering the vaccine before the end of the year, and how early before the end of the year depends really on infection rates in the community.
Labour’s Angela Eagle says people are less likely to cooperate with test and trace in poor areas than in rich areas. She asks Hancock to reconsider the case for improving sick pay for people asked to self-isolate.
Hancock says he will consider this. But he says the main reason for people not self-isolating is because people do not get a test in the first place. He wants to increase the uptake of testing, he says.
Updated
In the Commons Hancock tells MPs that he wants every person in the NHS to get a flu vaccine this winter, unless there is a very good reason why they should not have to have one.
My colleague Peter Walker points out that, in his lengthy reply to Jonathan Ashworth, Matt Hancock forgot to address Ashworth’s very first question. (See 4.52pm.)
In the Commons, Matt Hancock has answered every one of a long list of questions on coronavirus from Labour's Jon Ashworth.... apart from why chief nurse Ruth May was dropped from a No 10 briefing for not being 100% onside with the Cummings mantra. Odd he should forget that.
— Peter Walker (@peterwalker99) July 20, 2020
Hancock say the long-term effects of coronavirus can be very debilitating for a minority of patients. Without naming them, he says at least one MP is in this category.
Hancock says the advice telling people to shield is being withdrawn at the end of this month because the level of incidence is so low as to make that safe. He says staying at home all the time can be bad for people’s health too.
Jeremy Hunt, the chair of the Commons health select committee, praises Hancock for his stamina over the last few months, and says that his decision to set the 100,000 tests per day target was a turning point.
He asks what can be done to get more people tested.
About 1,700 a day are being infected by the virus and about 400 a day are going into NHS test and trace, which is about a quarter, so as we think about how to prevent a second wave, could [Hancock] give the house some details as to how we’re going to bridge that gap so that we can hopefully go into our Christmas holiday with the same cautious optimism that we’re going into our summer one.
Hancock welcomes what Hunt said about the 100,000 tests per day target, and jokes about how pleased he was to hear the PM set 500,000 tests a day as a target in his speech on Friday.
He accepts there is a problem with asymptomatic people not getting tested, and he says he wants people with even mild symptoms to request a test.
The main cause of the gap is people who are asymptomatic and therefore don’t know that they’ve got the virus and don’t come forward for testing, so we’re going to ramp up our communications to people - if in doubt, if you think you might have the symptoms, to come forward and get a test and of course ramp up our asymptomatic testing of high-risk groups.
Updated
Hancock is replying to Ashworth.
He welcomes Ashworth’s offer to stand shoulder to shoulder with the government against the anti-vaccine movement.
He says the government implemented the Sage advice on lockdown. Labour supported the government at the time.
More data has been provided to local authorities, he says. The department was providing postcode data, now it will provide details of individuals who have tested positive provided data protection agreements have been signed.
Hancock says he has learnt that things work best when the private sector and the public sector work together. He claims that Ashworth is refusing to accept that because he has been playing to his political base (ie by criticising the private sector).
Updated
Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, is responding to Matt Hancock.
He asks Hancock to confirm that the chief nursing officer was dropped from the No 10 press conference because she was minded to criticise Dominic Cummings.
This claim was revived at a Commons committee this afternoon. My colleague Rajeev Syal has the story.
Hancock says the preliminary results of the SNG001 trial are encouraging. (See 4.44pm.) But the data needs to be peer reviewed, he says.
He says the government will support a large-scale trial. But these preliminary results are positive.
Updated
Hancock is now speaking about the search for a vaccine.
He says the Oxford report published today is very encouraging.
The UK is putting more money into the global search for a vaccine than any other country, he says.
We’re working to ensure that whoever’s vaccine is approved first, the whole world can have access.
We reject narrow nationalism, we support a global effort because this virus respects no borders and we are all on the same side.
Updated
Matt Hancock's coronavirus statement to MPs
Matt Hancock, the health secretary, is making a statement to MPs about coronavirus.
Largely he has been summarising some of the announcements made by the prime minister on Friday.
I have already quoted one academic claiming that the results of the trial of interferon beta drug SNG001, that is said to have had remarkable success reducing the risk of people getting severely ill from coronavirus (see 11.04am), need to be treated with some caution. (See 12.13am.) The Science Media Centre has now contacted another four academics for comment, and three of them are also sceptical. You can read all the comments here.
This afternoon the updated Public Health England dashboard also records a further 11 UK coronavirus deaths, taking the total 45,312.
Confusingly, this is the figure that the Department of Health and Social Care is refusing to publish on its own website now after it emerged at the end of last week that the PHE total for England includes people who tested positive for coronavirus and who subsequently died - even if their death was not related to coronavirus.
It is unusual for one government body to reject statistics produced by another government body quite as bluntly as this, and the spat will be seen as fresh evidence that Public Health England’s days are numbered. There have already been plenty of reports saying ministers want to reorganise it after the crisis is over because of the way it is perceived to have mishandled issues like testing.
The headline death toll (45,312) is, of course, an understatement because it only includes people who tested positive for coronavirus. The true figure for all UK deaths attributed to coronavirus has passed 55,000.
Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have not recorded any coronavirus deaths today (see 2.24pm, 2.28pm and 2.30pm) and England has only recorded six (see 2.22pm.) Even allowing for the fact that recorded deaths are normally lower on a Monday than on other days of the week (because of the weekend, when people just as likely to die, but less likely to fill in paperwork), this is good news. The England figure seems to be the lowest since March.
But that does not mean the virus is being eliminated. According to the figures on the Public Health England dashboard, which has just had its daily update, the number of cases in the UK has been rising gradually this month.
Here is one graph.
And here is a chart with more detail. According to this graph, the seven-day rolling average for the number of new cases per day was 628.3 on Friday last week. Two weeks ago, on Sunday 5 July, the seven-day average was 546.1.
The UK is to immediately suspend its extradition treaty with Hong Kong and also bar the export of riot control equipment following Beijing’s imposition of a sweeping national security law on the territory, Dominic Raab has announced. My colleague Peter Walker has the full story here.
Updated
This is what Prof Andrew Pollard, one of the academics working on the Oxford coronavirus vaccine, told Sky News about the significance of today’s results.
What we found in this trial is, first of all, that the vaccine has a profile which is very, very similar to other types of vaccines like this – it is well tolerated by the volunteers who took part in the study – and, secondly, that we met a really important milestone, which showed that we’ve got strong immune responses, which we think are the sort that may be associated with protection. But of course we’ve got to keep going with the clinical trials to really establish whether or not we can prevent the disease in our population with these strong immune responses.
Explaining what would happen next, Pollard said:
We’re at the first stage here ... Now we have to wait to see whether people in the trial are protected. And that is going to take some time because we have to wait for diseases cases to occur in our population of people who are vaccinated in order to see whether we’ve got protection or not. And so it is difficult to predict exactly when we’ll have that readout from the vaccine. So I think it’s not necessarily caution to say it may take a while. We just don’t know the future. The lockdown here in the UK has been so successful that we have managed to suppress the virus considerably. But it hasn’t gone away. And so in time we are going to get an answer as to whether or not this vaccine works.
Pollard also confirmed that, because of the low prevalence rates in the UK, the Oxford vaccine is also being trialled in South Africa and Brazil. He said it could be the trials in those countries that showed whether or not it worked.
Updated
These are from Tom Whipple, science editor at the Times, on the Oxford vaccine results.
As expected, the results of the first human trial on the Oxford vaccine has dropped. It induces a strong response. pic.twitter.com/EcBbBXexpj
— whippletom (@whippletom) July 20, 2020
So too does a similar Chinese vaccine pic.twitter.com/ZxAY6Ks3xM
— whippletom (@whippletom) July 20, 2020
To be clear on this, this is indeed exciting - but this is not proof it works. Now we need results from the field. It is more it would have been catastrophic if it hadn't performed like this at this stage.
— whippletom (@whippletom) July 20, 2020
Oxford vaccine results 'major breakthrough in fight against coronavirus', says government
Boris Johnson has welcomed the early results from the Oxford University vaccine trial.
This is very positive news. A huge well done to our brilliant, world-leading scientists & researchers at @UniofOxford.
— Boris Johnson #StayAlert (@BorisJohnson) July 20, 2020
There are no guarantees, we’re not there yet & further trials will be necessary - but this is an important step in the right direction.https://t.co/PRUTu8rlPF
And this is from the Department of Health and Social Care.
.@UniofOxford has made a major breakthrough in the fight against #coronavirus.
— Department of Health and Social Care (@DHSCgovuk) July 20, 2020
Their latest trial has shown that a vaccine produces strong immunity response in participants.
This represents a positive step towards a coronavirus vaccine.
More info 🔽https://t.co/i6aoV09EFr
Updated
Here is the full article (pdf) in the Lancet with the early results of the Oxford vaccine trial.
Here is the conclusion.
In conclusion, ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 was safe, tolerated, and immunogenic, while reactogenicity was reduced with paracetamol. A single dose elicited both humoral and cellular responses against SARS-CoV-2, with a booster immunisation augmenting neutralising antibody titres. The preliminary results of this first-in-human clinical trial supported clinical development progression into ongoing phase 2 and 3 trials. Older age groups with comorbidities, health-care workers, and those with higher risk for SARS-CoV-2 exposure are being recruited and assessed for efficacy, safety, and immunogenicity of ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 given as a single-dose or two-dose administration regimen in further trials conducted in the UK and overseas. We will also evaluate the vaccine in children, once sufficient safety data have been accumulated in adult studies. Phase 3 trials are now underway in Brazil, South Africa, and the UK and the UK and will evaluate vaccine efficacy in diverse populations.
And here are some tweets from the Lancet summing up the findings in a slightly more straightforward manner.
NEW—UK’s #COVID19 vaccine is safe and induces an immune reaction, according to preliminary results https://t.co/rDPlB9fDKr pic.twitter.com/z2t9Aubjim
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
Preliminary results from a phase 1/2 trial involving 1077 healthy adults found that vaccine induced strong antibody & T cell immune responses up to day 56 of the ongoing trial. These responses may be even greater after a 2nd dose, according to a sub-group study of 10 participants
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
Compared to control group (given a meningitis vaccine), SARS-CoV-2 vaccine caused minor side effects more frequently, but some of these could be reduced by taking paracetamol. There were no serious adverse events from the vaccine
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
Fatigue & headache were the most commonly reported reactions (70% [340/487] of all participants given #COVID19 vaccine only reported fatigue & 68% [331/487] reported headache, vs 48% [227/477] & 41% [195/477], respectively, of participants in control group without paracetamol) pic.twitter.com/UZLZ3gAycj
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
T cell responses targeting SARS-CoV-2 spike protein were markedly increased (in the 43 participants studied), peaking after 14 days. The T cell response did not increase with a 2nd dose of the vaccine, which is consistent with other vaccines of this kind
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
Antibody responses peaked by day 28 (median 157 ELISA units–studied in 127 participants) & remained high until d 56 (median 119 ELISA units–in 43 participants) for those given 1 dose. This response was boosted by a 2nd dose(median 639 ELISA units at d 56 in these 10 participants) pic.twitter.com/rdPrLvRyPq
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
These antibody responses were present in all participants who had a booster dose of the vaccine (9 of 9 participants in MNA80 assay at day 42, and 10 of 10 in Marburg VN assay on day 56) pic.twitter.com/fO6U2bNY68
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
Authors say further clinical studies, including in older adults, should be done with this vaccine. Current results focus on immune response measured in the laboratory. Further testing is needed to confirm if vaccine effectively protects against infection https://t.co/rDPlB9fDKr
— The Lancet (@TheLancet) July 20, 2020
Here is a statement from Prof Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at Oxford University and head of the team working on the Oxford coronavirus vaccine, on the early trial results. (See 2.45pm.) She said:
There is still much work to be done before we can confirm if our vaccine will help manage the Covid-19 pandemic, but these early results hold promise.
As well as continuing to test our vaccine in phase-three trials, we need to learn more about the virus - for example, we still do not know how strong an immune response we need to provoke to effectively protect against Sars-Cov-2 infection.
If our vaccine is effective, it is a promising option as these types of vaccine can be manufactured at large scale.
A successful vaccine against Sars-Cov-2 could be used to prevent infection, disease and death in the whole population, with high-risk populations such as hospital workers and older adults prioritised to receive vaccination.
The BBC’s Fergus Walsh has more on the early trial results from the Oxford University coronavirus vaccine.
Strong immune response from Oxford coronavirus vaccine https://t.co/cbcodtXKSI
— Fergus Walsh (@BBCFergusWalsh) July 20, 2020
Oxford University coronavirus vaccine safe and induces immune reaction, early trial results show
PA Media has just snapped this about the Oxford University coronavirus vaccine trial.
The Covid-19 vaccine being developed at the University of Oxford is safe and induces an immune reaction, findings of the first phases of the study suggest.
And Northern Ireland has recorded no further coronavirus deaths, according to today’s daily bulletin from the Department of Health in Northern Ireland.
There have been no further coronavirus deaths in Wales either, according to Public Health Wales.
The latest number of confirmed cases of Coronavirus in Wales has been updated.
— Public Health Wales (@PublicHealthW) July 20, 2020
Data dashboard:
💻 https://t.co/zpWRYSUbfh
📱 https://t.co/HSclxpZjBh
Find out how we are responding to the spread of the virus in our daily statement here: https://t.co/u6SKHz0zsG pic.twitter.com/B1QEZ2Q0sw
In Scotland no further coronavirus deaths have been recorded, according to Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister.
No deaths of people confirmed as having COVID were registered yesterday. And 7 new positive cases were confirmed - a reduction compared to recent days, but they will still all be closely examined and contact tracing undertaken as appropriate. https://t.co/pQVDUBFZq9
— Nicola Sturgeon (@NicolaSturgeon) July 20, 2020
Updated
NHS England records six more coronavirus hospital deaths
NHS England has recorded six more coronavirus hospital deaths in England, taking the total to 29,187. The six new people who have died were aged between 74 and 98, and all had underlying health conditions.
The full details are here.
Updated
Matt Hancock, the health secretary, will make a statement to MPs later on coronavirus, after Dominic Raab’s statement on Hong Kong.
Today in the Commons chamber, MPs will debate the remaining stages of the Trade Bill. There will be two ministerial statements:
— UK House of Commons (@HouseofCommons) July 20, 2020
- @DominicRaab - China update
- @MattHancock - Update on Coronavirus Response
Find out more in the #OrderPaper : https://t.co/DpnOrGqARf pic.twitter.com/OkKl8bhMc6
Ministers to attend cabinet in person tomorrow as UK returns to work, No 10 confirms
The Downing Street lobby briefing is over. Here are some of the main points.
- Ministers will attend cabinet in person this week, for the first time since the lockdown, the prime minister’s spokesman confirmed. The meeting will take place tomorrow, in a ventilated room in the Foreign Office large enough to allow ministers to sit at least one metre apart. During the lockdown cabinet meetings have been taking place via videoconferencing, with only the prime minister and a handful of colleagues using the cabinet room at No 10. Explaining why ministers would be meeting in person, the prime minister’s spokesman said:
As we move forward with coronavirus recovery, and more people return to work in person, the PM felt that it was right for the cabinet to come together and have a face to face meeting ...
There will be hand sanitiser on entrance and exit to the room, and individual water and glasses. Essentially we will be following all the Covid secure guidance that we set out for businesses when they are considering having this kind of meeting.
- The spokesman refused to comment on reports that Boris Johnson may be visiting Scotland this week.
- The spokesman said the full regulations making the wearing of face coverings compulsory in shops in England would be published on Thursday. The rules come into force on Friday.
- The spokesman said there was no evidence that test and trace data has been used unlawfully, despite the government’s failure to produce a data protection impact assessment for it. (See 8.22am.)
- The spokesman played down suggestions that the government might try to force a Commons vote to remove Julian Lewis as chair of the intelligence and security committee. There was speculation that No 10 might try this after Lewis conspired with opposition MPs to get himself elected chair instead of Downing Street’s candidate, Chris Grayling. As a punishment Lewis had the Tory whip withdrawn. But the spokesman said he was not aware of any plan for a vote to remove him from the committee.
- The spokesman said he did not know when the ISC would publish the Russia report. The committee has said it will publish it before the Commons rises on Wednesday for the summer recess. When the report is published, the government will respond, the spokesman said.
In evidence to the Commons science committee last week Sir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser, said that as soon as Sage, the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, realised that the rate of coronavirus infections was doubling every three days, it recommended a full lockdown. That was about a week before the lockdown was ordered on 23 March, he suggested.
But, in a detailed blog based on an analysis of Sage minutes, the scientist James Annan says Vallance may have misremembered the timings. He says the minutes show that it was not until 23 March that Sage accepted that the doubling time was three days. This evidence counters the claim that ministers ignored the scientific advice as they delayed ordering a full lockdown (although official minutes do not cover the full range of advice given, informally as well as formally, and exactly who said what on this topic, and when, will end up being at the heart of the inevitable inquiry).
Updated
In an interview this morning during his school visit in Kent Boris Johnson insisted that the government was not abandoning its policy of engaging with China. Speaking ahead of the statement in the Commons this afternoon from Dominic Raab, the foreign secretary, in which Raab is expected to announce the suspension of the extradition treaty with Hong Kong, Johnson said:
There is a balance here.
I’m not going to be pushed into a position of becoming a knee-jerk Sinophobe on every issue, somebody who is automatically anti-China. But we do have serious concerns.
Johnson said Raab would set out “how we are going to change our extradition arrangements to reflect our concerns about what’s happening with the security law in Hong Kong”. But he said the UK would not “completely abandon our policy of engagement” with China.
You have got to have a calibrated response and we are going to be tough on some things but also going to continue to engage.
Marks & Spencer to cut 950 jobs in latest Covid-19 blow to high street
Marks & Spencer is cutting 950 jobs at its head office and stores in the latest blow to UK high street retailers hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, my colleagues Jasper Jolly and Sarah Butler report.
An academic has expressed concern that the Synairgen trial of the interferon beta drug SNG001, that seems to have had remarkably successful results (see 10.37am and 11.04am), was not registered in advance (ie, notified formally to other researchers). Steve Goodacre, a professor of emergency medicine at the University of Sheffield, said he needed to know more from the company about how the trial was carried out before he could evaluate its significance. In a statement he said:
These results are not interpretable. We need the full details and, perhaps more importantly, the trial protocol. The trial should have been registered and a protocol made available before any analysis was undertaken. They could easily have included a link to the trial protocol in their press release. I am concerned they have not done this.
The trial protocol will provide crucial details, such as what the primary outcome measure was and whether the trial was designed to detect the differences in outcome reported in their press release. As it stands, we have no way of knowing whether the trial was designed to detect the positive outcomes reported in the press release (which would be more convincing) or whether these are just serendipitous findings from a trial that was designed for another purpose (which would be bad reporting practice).
I would therefore ask them to provide the trial registration details and trial protocol before commenting further.
Updated
Updated
The chief negotiators in post-Brexit talks will attempt to breath new life into the stalled process when they start a further round of talks this week.
EU chief negotiator, Michel Barnier, is expected to meet his UK counterpart David Frost for dinner in London on Monday, ahead of a formal negotiating round that will last until Thursday lunchtime.
Progress remains elusive, despite recent intensified talks that have seen the teams meeting in smaller groups in an attempt to break the deadlock.
Barnier and his team are understood to have seen no progress on core sticking points, including EU conditions for a zero-tariff free-trade agreement, governance arrangements for the deal and fishing rights. “Similar divergences still exist,” said an EU source. “It’s not like all of a sudden we are in a tunnel,” a Brussels term to describe the most intense phase of a negotiation.
EU sources believe the UK has failed to respond to Barnier’s overtures of compromise, such as on fishing.
Following meetings in Brussels last week, a UK spokesperson said “significant differences still remain between us on a number of important issues”, adding that talks continued “to be constructive and useful”.
The two sides also remain at odds over how quickly they can nail down the basic outlines of a deal. The UK would like to set out core principles in a paper over the summer, but the EU are wary of what they perceive as a process that could be a distraction from writing legal text.
Updated
Johnson plays down prospect of vaccine being available this year
On a school visit in Kent this morning Boris Johnson played down the prospects of a coronavirus vaccine being available this year. Asked he was confident that a vaccine might be ready before 2021, he replied:
I wish I could say that I was 100% confident that we will get a vaccine for Covid-19. As you know, there are about 100 different scientific ventures out in the field now. The UK has got some world-leading scientists engaged in this. There’s the Oxford programme where we have secured 100m doses already.
What we are saying today is we’re investing also in a couple of potential vaccines, one French, one German - 90m doses that we’re going to be investing in.
Obviously I’m hopeful. I’ve got my fingers crossed. But to say that I’m 100% confident that we’ll get a vaccine this year, or indeed next year, that is, alas, an exaggeration. We are not there yet.
If you talk to the scientists, they think that the sheer weight of international effort is going to produce something. They are pretty confident that we’ll get some sorts of treatments, some sorts of vaccines, that really make a difference.
But right now can I tell you that I’m 100% confident? No.
That’s why we’ve got to continue with our current approach, maintaining social distancing measures ... washing hands ... wearing face masks in confined spaces like on public transport or in shops. And then we will continue to drive the virus down by our own collective action.
It may be that the vaccine is going to come riding over the hill like the cavalry. But we just can’t count on it right now.
Johnson’s emphasis on the need forphysical distancing to continue, because there is no guarantee of a vaccine being available this year, differs slightly from the message he gave on Friday, when he said that distancing could be relaxed from November if the virus continued to be driven down.
Updated
Patients in coronavirus drug trial had 79% lower chance of getting severe disease, say researchers
Here is the press notice (pdf) from Synairgen with more details of the successful trial of the interferon beta drug used to treat coronavirus patients. (See 10.37am.) The drug is know as SNG001.
The firm says patients who took the drug in the trial had a 79% lower chance of developing a severe version of the disease than patients taking a placebo. PA Media sums up the findings here:
The current trial was carried out on a double-blind and placebo-controlled basis - meaning neither the researchers nor the 101 patients knew whether they were receiving SNG001, a special formulation of the naturally occurring anti-viral protein interferon beta 1a (IFN-beta), or a placebo.
It found that the odds of developing severe disease - needing ventilation or resulting in death - during the treatment period of up to 16 days were reduced by 79% for patients receiving the drug compared with patients who received the placebo.
Results of the study indicate that, over the treatment period, the measure of breathlessness was markedly reduced in patients who received SNG001.
Three people (6%) died after being randomly assigned the placebo, while there were no deaths among those who received the drug, Synairgen said.
In patients with more severe disease at time of admission, SNG001 treatment increased the likelihood of hospital discharge during the study, but researchers say the difference was not statistically significant.
Beefeater guards face layoffs as Tower of London forced to cut costs
The historic Beefeater guards are facing layoffs for what is believed to be the first time in their 500-year history as part of “heartbreaking” measures to cut costs at the Tower of London following the coronavirus crisis, PA Media reports.
The pandemic has seen the temporary closure of six sites run by Historic Royal Palaces (HRP), which all rely heavily on visitor income. A spokesperson for HRP confirmed that a voluntary redundancy scheme had been introduced last month and that staff had been warned that a compulsory redundancy scheme was likely to follow. HRP believes it is the first time that the guards, recognisable for their decorative red and black uniforms, have faced redundancy in their long history - having been formed by Henry VII in 1485.
At least two of the 37 Yeoman Warders, nicknamed Beefeaters, who guard the crown jewels, have reportedly taken voluntary redundancy already, PA Media reports. HRP chief executive John Barnes said the organisation had “simply had no choice” but to make the cuts. He said:
Historic Royal Palaces is a self-funded charity. We depend on visitors for 80% of our incomes.
The closure of our six sites for almost four months has dealt a devastating blow to our finances, which we expect to continue for the rest of the financial year and to be compounded by the slow recovery of international tourism.
We have taken every possible measure to secure our financial position, but we need to do more to survive in the long term.
We simply have no choice but to reduce our payroll costs.
Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA
Updated
Different vaccines might be needed for different groups of people, says vaccine taskforce chief
Kate Bingham, chair of the UK vaccine taskforce, told the Today programme this morning that there is unlikely to be a single coronavirus vaccine that will suit everyone. She explained:
What we are doing is identifying the most promising vaccines across the different categories, or different types of vaccine, so that we can be sure that we do have a vaccine in case one of those actually proves to be both safe and effective.
It’s unlikely to be a single vaccine for everybody.
We may well need different vaccines for different groups of people.
Drug that helps patients recover from coronavirus in trials described as potential 'game changer'
An academic has described a new treatment for coronavirus as a possible “game changer”. As reported earlier (see 7.42am), Tom Wilkinson, professor of respiratory medicine at the University of Southampton, has used the term to describe the results of a trial that he has been overseeing. Explaining the results, he told the Today programme:
Interferon beta is a naturally occurring protein that the body produces to help fight off viral infections. And our trial has explored the use of this drug in a nebulised, in an inhaled form, given to patients who have Covid-19 and are severe enough to be admitted to hospital.
We’ve completed a randomised controlled trial, so 100 or so patients were randomised to either the drug, or a blinded placebo. They were tracked very closely during their hospital admission and into their home situation, followed up up to a month. And what we found was very positive.
We found that the patients receiving the interferon beta treatment were much less likely to deteriorate from the point they entered the trial through the next two weeks, and the effect of that was significant.
We also found that not only did the patients not deteriorate, but those patients were also more likely to recover quickly. We know Covid-19 has a longterm consequence for many patients, so we were very excited to see that within the trial window about twice as many patients were making a full recovery on interferon beta than in the placebo arm.
Wilkinson said that further studies would be needed, and that these results might not be applicable to the entire population. The regulatory agencies would need to decide whether more trials were needed before the drug could be rolled out in a clinical setting, he said. But the results were “very positive” for this stage, he said.
He also said that Synairgen, the company producing the drug, was already exploring ramping up manufacturing capability.
Mosque leaders in Blackburn have reportedly told around 250 people to self-isolate following a funeral service in the town.
Jamia Ghosia mosque said they were being investigated by police and health officials following the funeral prayer on 13 July, but had believed there were no restrictions on numbers if hygiene and physical distancing measures were in place.
The mosque’s imam is understood to have since tested positive for Covid-19, while the building has been closed until further notice while a deep clean takes place, according to LancsLive.
It comes as Blackburn with Darwen was found to have overtaken Leicester as the local authority with the highest rate of coronavirus infections in England. Data from NHS Digital shows that in the week 11 July to 17 July, there were 79.2 cases of the virus per 100,000 people in Blackburn, compared to 77.7 in Leicester
Following the funeral service, an email was sent to worshippers by leaders, advising those who attended to self-isolate for seven days or to get a test for the virus.
The message, seen by the BBC, said:
Furthermore the mosque is under investigation by the police and public health for exceeding the number of people allowed to participate in a funeral, which is 30, and for failing to comply with the law.
There is a possibility that other attendees may also have been infected at the Janazza [sic] prayers.
Updated
Earlier Damien mentioned the Telegraph splash saying that an internal government report concluded that more than 200,000 people could die indirectly as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, from delayed hospital operations. (See 8.41am.)
The story is based on this report (pdf), released a few weeks ago as part of the regular releases of Sage coronavirus background papers. It is a document called Internal estimates of excess deaths from Covid-19, prepared by officials from the Department of Health and Social Care, the ONS, the government’s actuary’s department and the Home Office.
Here is an extract.
The NHS is trying to reduce risks from COVID-19 to patients and increase its ability to respond to the crisis, by continuing to treat urgent elective patients, such as most cancer treatments, and deprioritising non-urgent care, with an emphasis on risk management. This should avoid short-term deaths but there will be a longer-term knock-on impact from delaying so many non-urgent services ...
We are unable to provide a detailed estimate of the impact of these changes to healthcare activity as it is unclear precisely what activity would be postponed, for how long, what knock-on impact this would have on future patient waits, and how a delay in treatment would affect outcomes. Instead, we have modelled a scenario whereby we assume 75% of elective care activity is stopped for a period of six months. Various evidence supports the estimate that 75% of elective care has been postponed, but it is unclear how long the postponement will be for. This activity represents around £17bn of expenditure over a six-month period. If this activity were cancelled entirely it would result in an estimated 185,000 additional deaths ...
This is an upper-bound estimate for this scenario. The NHS will be prioritising life-saving treatments and will be hoping to postpone rather than cancel most of this treatment. However, there will be a knock-on impact on future patients as the NHS takes time to work through the backlog.
If services can be resumed quickly, most of the risk of mortality can likely be managed, but if there are continuing delays for a longer period, there could even be a proportionately greater impact than is estimated here, if long waiting lists build up and have a knock-on impact on future patients requiring healthcare.
Updated
Agenda for the day
Good morning. I’m Andrew Sparrow, taking over from Damien Gayle.
Here is the agenda for the day.
10am: George Eustice, the environment secretary, speaks at a Green Alliance event.
Morning: Boris Johnson and Sir Keir Starmer are both due to be visiting schools.
12.30pm: Downing Street is expected to hold its lobby briefing.
2.30pm: Robert Jenrick, the communities secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
2.30pm: Sir Chris Wormald, permanent secretary at the Department for Health and Social Care, and other officials give evidence to the Commons public accounts committee about nursing.
After 3.30pm: Dominic Raab, the foreign secretary, is expected to make a statement in the Commons about suspending the extradition treaty with Hong Kong.
And at some point today early results from the Oxford University coronavirus vaccine trial are due to be published by the Lancet.
Updated
Schools need to be prepared for the possibility of local lockdowns, as the country gets to grips with the spread of the coronavirus, the education secretary has said.
Gavin Williamson told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:
We have been clear to schools that they have to plan for a scenario where they are in a situation where we see local lockdowns, and how we have that continuity of education that flows all the way through.
Here are the latest confirmed coronavirus statistics for the UK.
The figures come from data published by Public Health England, working with the Department for Health and Social Care and Health Protection Scotland.
UK signs deals for 90m doses of Covid-19 vaccine
The UK has signed deals for more than 90m doses of Covid-19 vaccine, the PA news agency reports.
The government has secured an agreement for 30m doses of a drug being developed by BioNTech and the German firm Pfizer. The treatment is undergoing a phase two trial.
There has also been a deal, in principle, for 60m doses of a vaccine being developed by the French biotech company Valneva.
The 90m doses is in addition to 100m being developed by Oxford University in partnership with AstraZeneca, as well as another batch at Imperial College London, which started human trials in June.
The business secretary, Alok Sharma, said the latest agreements would “ensure the UK has the best chance possible of securing a vaccine that protects those most at risk”.
There are more details here, in a news release from the business department.
Updated
According to the Telegraph this morning, a government report has shown that more than 200,000 people could die from the impact of the lockdown and the measures implemented in the name of “protecting the NHS”.
The paper has for several months pursued an editorial line that the impact of the strict measures to curb the spread of coronavirus in the UK may have the effect of killing more people than they save.
It says the report predicting the potentially catastrophic effects of the lockdown emerged after Sir Patrick Vallance, the chief scientific advisor, told MPs on the science and technology select committee that calculations had been made to predict the effects of the measures.
TELEGRAPH: Lockdown may cause 200,000 extra deaths #TomorrowsPapersToday pic.twitter.com/mE06THLDFL
— Neil Henderson (@hendopolis) July 19, 2020
According to the Telegraph the report warned there could be 500 more suicides in the first wave, followed by between 600-12,000 extra suicides per year a subsequent recession. There could also be about 20 more deaths over the year as a result of domestic violence. Many more deaths could result from the cancellation of hospital appointments.
A “worst-case scenario” could have seen as many as 250,000 extra deaths, the report was said to have warned.
Updated
Marks & Spencer 'to cut hundreds of jobs' as coronavirus hits sales
Marks & Spencer is reportedly planning to cut hundreds of jobs this week in the latest blow to high-street retailers already hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, writes Jasper Jolly for the Guardian’s business desk.
An announcement about job losses could come as soon as this week, Sky News reported, with total redundancies potentially running to several thousand when existing restructuring plans are taken into account.
It comes amid a torrid time for the British high street, with thousands of job losses announced this month. John Lewis and Boots this month announced 1,300 and 4,000 job losses respectively, including store closures, while companies including Topshop owner Arcadia, furniture chain Harveys and menswear retailer TM Lewin have unveiled plans for thousands of redundancies.
Updated
Test-and-trace programme broke data protection law, government admits
The government has been forced to admit that the Covid-19 test-and-trace programme was unlawfully deployed, following a legal challenge from privacy campaigners.
Officials from the Department for Health and Social Care were forced into the admission by a legal challenge by the Open Rights Group over the government’s failure to conduct a data protection impact assessment of the scheme.
Without the assessment, which has still not taken place, the government’s test and trace operation is operating illegally.
Jim Killock, executive director of the ORG, said:
The reckless behaviour of this government in ignoring a vital and legally required safety step known as the data protection impact assessment (DPIA) has endangered public health. We have a ‘world beating’ unlawful test-and-trace programme.
A crucial element in the fight against the pandemic is mutual trust between the public and the government, which is undermined by their operating the programme without basic privacy safeguards. The government bears responsibility for the public health consequences.
The test-and-trace programme is central to easing the lockdown and getting the economy growing again. The ICO should have taken action but did not. We were forced to threaten judicial review to ensure that people’s privacy is protected.
The ICO and parliament must ensure that test and trace is operating safely and lawfully. As we have already seen individual contractors sharing patient data on social media platforms, emergency remedial steps will need to be taken.
Updated
Gavin Williamson, the education secretary, has said he would “absolutely” take part in a coronavirus vaccine trial, as the government announced it had signed new deals which will provide more than 90 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine, the PA Media agency reports.
Williamson told BBC Breakfast on Monday that 500,000 people would be needed to take part in clinical trials during the winter months. A poll last week found that as many as one in four adults in the UK could refuse to take the vaccine.
Asked if a vaccine would be ready by winter, Williamson said:
The whole purpose is that they will be getting trialled out. Half a million people will be having the trials of these vaccines and it will be something that comes after winter.
Asked if he would take part in a trial, he said:
Absolutely. As you are probably aware politicians tend to meet lots of people, so it would be a sensible thing to do.
Updated
The Daily Mail splashes this morning on the bureaucratic backlogs built up while millions have been out of work during coronavirus restrictions, citing campaigners who have said they are “paralysing the country”.
Monday's Mail: Backlog Britain #TomorrowsPapersToday #DailyMail pic.twitter.com/poahZppgZp
— Tomorrow's Papers Today (@TmorrowsPapers) July 19, 2020
According to the paper:
- Thousands of elderly motorists are housebound and isolated because of chaos at the DVLA
- Travellers are waiting more than four months for passports to be processed, causing families to cancel holidays
- Grieving relatives are suffering the extra heartache of long delays in obtaining probate to administer estates
- Backlogs are placing huge pressure on the NHS, with nearly 200,000 suspected cancer cases waiting for key tests – a rise of 44%.
The Daily Mail quotes Sir Iain Duncan Smith, the former Conservative leader, as saying:
The side-effects of the lockdown are astonishing and dangerous. Lockdown for the economy and public services has been a total unmitigated disaster.
We’re now in a race to get everything up and running before everything crashes completely and unemployment soars. We have got to persuade the public that we have to get back to work, that if they take reasonable precautions the vast majority should be OK.
Updated
Labour warns over summer childcare arrangements
Kate Green, the shadow education secretary, has been doing the rounds of broadcast interviews this morning to talk about childcare, a crucial issue now that the government is keen to push parents back to work.
On BBC Breakfast, Green said that parents needed more time to plan for childcare arrangements before they were able to return to the workplace. She said the government had not given parents enough “notice” to put childcare arrangements in place during the school holidays.
I think they (parents) need, first and foremost, time to plan.
Plan to put childcare in place because many parents of course will have been furloughed and at home looking after their children and so may have cancelled their own childcare arrangements ...
I think the problem we have got is that the Government is making grand announcements at very short notice and not really giving businesses or schools and childcare providers or families proper advance notice so they can put their necessary arrangements in place.
"The government has a bit of a tendency to wash its hands of all that detail"
— BBC Breakfast (@BBCBreakfast) July 20, 2020
Shadow Education Secretary, Kate Green MP, tells #BBCBreakfast schools and nurseries need "sensible implementation plans" for returning to full capacity.
More here: https://t.co/9fR0POBd49 pic.twitter.com/lzsHNNlZek
Green said said one in four childcare providers believe they will not be in business by the end of the year, adding that the prospect of providers going out of business was “really worrying” for parents who need to find childcare when they return to work.
The problem for childcare providers is that lack of capacity means a lack of income and some of them are becoming financially unviable.
So the consequence of less demand is that it’s possible, and indeed the childcare providers are saying this, that some of them will go out of business altogether.
One in four think they may not still be around within the year, and that’s really worrying when parents need to find childcare places so they can go back to work and know that their children are being looked after safely.
Updated
Preliminary results from a clinical trial have suggested on a treatment for Covid-19 that dramatically reduces the number of patients needing intensive care, BBC News reports, citing the company that has developed the drug.
Synairgen, a Southampton-based biotech company, said their interferon beta based treatment reduces the chance of a Covid-19 patient in hospital developing serious disease by 79%, while patients were two to three times more likely to recover without lasting ill-effects.
The scientist leading the trial, Tom Wilkinson, said the results, if confirmed in larger studies, will make the new treatment a “game changer”. The company is reportedly tooling up to produce large quantities of the drug.
It is not the first time, though, that interferons have been touted as effective treatments for Covid-19. For months, Cuba has been exporting interferon alpha-based drugs around the world.
Interferons have long been used internationally to treat dengue fever, cancer and hepatitis B and C. Studies during the SARS epidemic in 2003 suggested interferons might also be useful against coronaviruses.
Good morning, this is Damien Gayle covering the morning news on coronavirus for the next couple of hours, while Andy Sparrow has his Weetabix and warms up his typing fingers.
Top of the agenda today will be a visit to the UK from the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, according to the PA news agency. Pompeo will meet the prime minister, Boris Johnson, and the foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, and is expected to discuss global priorities, including the Covid-19 economic recovery plans, issues related to China and Hong Kong, and the US-UK free trade agreement negotiations.
