The Health Secretary, Matt Hancock has partly blamed India for the major delay to the supply and rollout of UK’s jab.
It has been confirmed that there has been delays of 5m doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine from India which is in part why there will be fewer doses over the coming weeks.
Hancock told MPs in the Commons, “In April, supply is tighter than this month and we have a huge number of second doses to deliver.
“During April, around 12m people, including many colleagues in this House will receive their second dose.
“These second doses cannot be delayed as they have to be delivered within 12 weeks of the first dose.
“In the last week, we’ve had a batch of 1.7 million doses delayed because of the need to retest its stability.
“Events like this are to be expected in a manufacturing endeavour of this complexity and this shows the rigour of our safety checks.”
The Health Secretary insisted that people will still be offered their first dose in April for all over 50s.
Hancock told MP, “There will be no weeks in April with no first doses. There will be no cancelled appointments as a result of supply issues, second doses will go ahead as planned.”
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