Britain, we learned this morning, has become the first country in the world to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, which is likely to be deployed from Monday onwards. Is Britain being reckless, or are other countries dragging their heels?
The first point to make is that, however tempting though it may be to think so, it is not a case of Britain taking advantage of new-found freedoms enabled by Brexit. It may be in the future that Britain develops a more nimble regulatory system than the EU, and that British patients can benefit for the earlier administration of drugs, but the UK will remain under the European Medicines Agency’s regulatory system until the end of the transition period in a month’s time.
Today’s decision has been possible thanks to the Human Medicines Regulations 2012, which allow Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to grant temporary emergency use authorisation in circumstances such as this.
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