Science Museum Group
Coronavirus: RNA to the rescue
The UK is the first country in the world to give temporary authorisation to the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccine for emergency pandemic use.
This is a new kind of vaccine, based on RNA, and the first approved for use in humans. Roger Highfield, Science Director, talks to Dr Berkeley Phillips, UK Medical Director of Pfizer.
The urgent need for mass vaccination against COVID-19 has been underlined by the emergence of a new strain of SARS-CoV-2, which goes by the name B.1.1.7 and appears to be faster at spreading between people. Expert reaction has ranged from calls for more research to accusations that the strain is a ‘political football.’