An Early Bird Catches the Virus

Like many people, I would be a good deal happier if the Covid-19 'mass vaccination' in Europe, was being rolled out a bit more quickly (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/dec/27/vaccination-rolls-out-across-europe-but-anger-remains-over-late-start). Some 300 million doses of the Pfiser/BioNtech vaccine have been bulk-ordered by the EU (you actually need 2 doses of the vaccine per patient and more than 740 million people live in Europe, so around only 20% of the population could be treated with this material). Apparently, the first 12.5 million doses have been delivered and vaccinations have started/will start more-or-less simultaneously in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, France, Germany, Luxembourg and Spain on the 27th and 28th of December. The laid-back Irish will only start injecting on the 30th. The bulk-order was to stop rich countries buying up the vaccine first. The late start is due to worries about the 'cold chain' needed for this mRNA vaccine. Other vaccines are in the pipeline but some face delays, before they are likely to be approved (in one case, it seems likely to be the end of 2021 before it will become available). All this seems a bit too slow and localised. The longer the virus is in populations (any population), the more opportunity it has to mutate.