On Sunday, Professor Susan Hopkins, Public Health England’s coronavirus strategy chief, said cases of Covid have fallen by more than 30 per cent in the last fortnight.
But she said it would take two weeks before it was possible to see whether this was linked to the rollout of vaccines, warning that there would be a lag before a fall in hospitalisations and deaths was seen.
Government figures showed that a further 587 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for coronavirus, while there were a further 21,088 lab-confirmed cases recorded in the UK. The rolling seven-day total of 169,714 is down 32.5 per cent.
Professor Martin Green, the chief executive of Care England said the rollout of jabs to care home residents was a “wonderful achievement”, adding: “While we celebrate this success, we will never forget the loss of life and my thoughts are with all those who have lost someone close to them.”
In total, the UK has ordered 367 million doses of seven types of jab, including 247 million of five types of vaccine now proven to work in clinical trials.
So far, progress has been constrained by the timing of deliveries from Pfizer and Astra Zeneca, who between them have promised 140 million doses in total but supply will expand in the spring, with around 17 million doses of Moderna vaccine expected to start coming through in April.
The UK has also ordered 60 million doses of a vaccine by Novovax and 30 million of one by Johnson & Johnson, which should add to stocks later in the year once regulators have assessed the data.
