British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is on course to lose his own seat and neither of the two main political parties is likely to win an outright majority at the next general election, not due until 2024, according to a new poll.
Britain will allow people to be given shots of different Covid-19 vaccines on rare occasions, despite a lack of evidence about the extent of immunity offered by mixing doses. In a departure from other strategies globally, the government said people could be given a mix-and-match of two Covid-19 shots, for example if the same vaccine dose was out of stock, according to guidelines published on New Year's Eve.
Amidst growing pressure over sufficient supplies of COVID-19 vaccines in the UK, pharmaceutical companies have hit back at government claims that access to enough jabs was a "limiting factor", insisting there was no issue at their end. While AstraZeneca says it expects 2 million doses of the Oxford University vaccine to be ready each week in just over a fortnight, Pfizer BioNTech said the number of doses it has now sent to the UK is "in the millions".
Britain abolished the so-called “tampon tax” on Friday, eliminating sales taxes on women's sanitary products. The move was widely praised by women's rights campaigners as well as proponents of the country's departure from the European Union. Treasury chief Rishi Sunak had committed to ending the widely unpopular tax on tampons and pads in his budget statement in March but the change could only come into effect on Friday after Britain had finally left the economic orbit of the EU.
The United Kingdom left the European Union's orbit on Thursday, turning its back on a tempestuous 48-year liaison. Brexit, in essence, took place at the strike of midnight in Brussels, or 2300 London time (GMT), when the United Kingdom ended the de facto membership, known as the transition period, which lasted 11 months after it formally left on Jan. 31.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's father Stanley confirmed plans on Thursday to seek French citizenship as the free movement of Britons in the EU comes to an end under the Brexit pact delivered by his son. Europe is more than the single market, it's more than the European Union." "That said, to have a link like that with the EU is important," he said, apparently referring to an EU passport.
Britain said on Wednesday it would prioritise making sure that more people receive their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine quickly over giving a second shot to those who have already had one, a change in strategy as the country battles record numbers of new coronavirus cases.
The British government has extended its toughest coronavirus restrictions to three-quarters of England's population as the fast-spreading new variant of Covid virus has reached most of the country. The government said that the top infection-warning level, Tier 4, would be expanded beyond London and the southeast to cover large swaths of central, northern and southwest England.
Britain on Wednesday authorized emergency use of a second Covid-19 vaccine, becoming the first country to greenlight an easy-to-handle shot that its developers hope will become the "vaccine for the world." The Department of Health said it had accepted a recommendation from the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency to authorize the vaccine developed by Oxford University and UK-based drugmaker AstraZeneca.
UK on Wednesday became the first country in the world to approve a coronavirus vaccine developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca as it battles a major winter surge driven by a new, highly contagious variant of the virus. "The government has today accepted the recommendation from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to authorise Oxford University/AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine for use," the health ministry said. Regulatory endorsement is a welcome boost for AstraZeneca and the Oxford team, which have been accused of a lack of clarity about the results from late-stage trials.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's toddler son Archie was heard speaking for the first time on Tuesday, as the couple released their first podcast, with British media seizing on his "American" accent. Archie wished listeners "Happy New Year" at the end of the couple's debut on the Spotify audio streaming platform. Archie's appearance comes after the couple launched a spate of legal actions against the media over alleged breaches of their privacy.
The new strain of coronavirus, called B.1.1.7., is likely to have led to a rapid surge in the number of coronavirus cases in the UK in the last weeks of December. Hospitals across the country are grappling with increased occupancy of Covid patients.
The new rules, confirmed on Monday, will prohibit retailers from offering multibuy promotions such as “buy one get one free” or “3 for 2” offers on these products. Free refills of sugary soft drinks will also be prohibited in the eating-out sector.
British hospitals are canceling non-urgent procedures and scrambling to find space for Covi-19 patients as coronavirus cases continue to surge despite tough new restrictions imposed to curb a fast-spreading new variant of the virus. Nick Scriven, immediate past president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said Monday that the rising number of hospitalized patients was "extremely worrying."
The Covid-19 vaccine developed by the British drugs group AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford has achieved a "winning formula" for efficacy, the company's chief executive said on Sunday.The vaccine, currently being evaluated by Britain's independent medicines regulator, provides "100 percent protection" against severe Covid disease requiring hospitalisation, Pascal Soriot said in an interview with the Sunday Times newspaper.
