COVID news live – latest updates: 30 million jabs given out in UK – as thousands book cruise to nowhere for their holidays

What do current UK vaccine supplies look like?

Analysis by Paul Kelso, business correspondent

A recent shipment from the Serum Institute of India – totalling five million doses – has fuelled a surge in the rollout, with a new record of more than 840,000 first and second doses delivered on Saturday, double the seven-day average a few days earlier.

That is about to come to a halt, however, after SII told the government last week it would not complete its total order of 10 million doses, and a further 1.7 million AstraZeneca shots produced in the UK were delayed by the need for re-testing.

That prompted the NHS to halt first doses entirely from 29 March in order to deal with demand for second doses that increases steeply in April, 12 weeks on from the start of the rollout in earnest.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock told parliament last week that despite the delays 12 million second doses would be delivered in the five weeks from 29 March. 

Initially that is going to place a premium on supplies of the Pfizer, which dominated the early weeks of the rollout. The yellow-card data shows that, by the end of January, 6.6 million Pfizer doses had been distributed against three million of the AstraZeneca. 

Given the 12-week timeline for second doses, the UK will need at least as many of the Pfizer and AstraZeneca doses in April. 

The intention is to have the supplies to match second doses with the first, though regulators and the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation have not ruled out “mixing and matching”, and trials are under way to see if it might even improve efficacy.