Vaccine rollout is boost for Boris Johnson and business – The Yorkshire Post says

First, these are matters for Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s Budget on March 3. Second, an open-ended extension to these policies would suggest that there is no end in sight to the Covid pandemic.

This is not necessarily so. All the evidence suggests that the first four target groups will be vaccinated by Monday in a remarkable feat of logistics and medical innovation which is the envy of the world.

Mr Johnson used his exchanges with Sir Keir to confirm that “in just a few days we will be setting out a road map for the way out of this pandemic” – a hint that the lockdown is working.

He also told York Outer MP Julian Sturdy that there’s a desire to get pupils back to school “on March 8 if we possibly can” – a hint at further grounds for quiet optimism.

But most telling of all was the response of Mr Johnson when his widely-respected former Cabinet colleague Julian Smith, the Skipton and Ripon MP, asked about the UK’s readiness to adjust the vaccine programme in the wake of new strains of Covid.

“We recently announced an agreement for 50 million doses with the manufacturer CureVac because we believe that may help us to develop vaccines that can respond at scale to new variants of the virus,” said Mr Johnson.

This is key. Yet, while it was an acceptance that people will probably need to be re-vaccinated in the autumn, it suggests the Government is already preparing for this possibility and has a plan in place.

And while public health guidance, and Covid testing protocols, remain critical, Mr Johnson’s answers suggest that this lockdown is having the desired effect and businesses – the firms that will power-drive the recovery – can begin to prepare for the future.

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