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Oxford / London (dpa) - Great Britain has approved the corona vaccine from the University of Oxford and the pharmaceutical company Astrazeneca.
The British Medicines Agency has approved the domestic vaccine, the British Ministry of Health announced.
Studies have shown that the agent is less effective than the vaccine that has already been approved by Biontech and Pfizer, but it can be stored at refrigerator temperatures and is significantly cheaper.
In Great Britain, the first vaccinations should take place on January 4th, as Health Minister Matt Hancock announced.
It was "brilliant to end 2020 with such a moment of hope," said Hancock.
According to the first study data, the vaccine should offer an average of 70 percent protection against Covid-19.
According to the group, the effectiveness could possibly be significantly higher with a special dosage.
At times there were doubts about the study design and the high effectiveness of the vaccine.
The Swedish-British group had therefore carried out additional investigations.
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Unlike the vaccines from the Mainz company Biontech and the pharmaceutical company Pfizer as well as the US company Moderna, the British-Swedish preparation does not belong to the mRNA vaccines.
The active ingredient AZD1222 used by Astrazeneca is based on the weakened version of a cold virus from chimpanzees.
It contains genetic material from a surface protein with which the Sars-CoV-2 pathogen docks onto human cells.
The agent works in two ways: It is supposed to promote the formation of specific antibodies as well as T cells - both are important for the immune system.
The UK is one of the worst hit countries in Europe by the pandemic.
Almost 80,000 people have already died there with or from Covid-19.
The number of new infections has recently increased dramatically.
53,000 new cases were reported on Tuesday.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 201230-99-849497 / 2