this is bbc news, i'm reeta chakrabarti. the headlines at nine.... the coronavirus vaccine developed by astrazeneca and oxford university becomes the second vaccine in the uk to receive regulatory approval. the study‘s director says it is a landmark moment. it's a moment to celebrate and to have some optimism about where we've got to today, and moving forward. but we have to keep up this battle against the virus. the government has ordered 100 million doses, enough to vaccinate 50 million people. the health secretary says the first jabs will be given in the new year. today's news is great news for the ability of the vaccine to make us safe. and make us safe faster than we

previously could have done. the news comes as more parts of england are to expected be moved into the highest level of coronavirus restrictions, tier 4. eu leaders sign the post—brexit trade deal agreed with britain on the eve of its departure from the eu single market, it will now be flown to london. here, the prime minister is due to start a debate in the house of commons shortly — as he asks mps to back the brexit trade deal in a vote this afternoon we'll have special coverage. good morning and welcome to bbc news. in a landmark moment in the fight against the coronavirus pandemic, the uk medicines regulator has approved the coronavirus vaccine developed by astrazeneca and scientists at oxford university. the approval means it is both safe

and effective, and is expected to begin being adminstered in the new year. it's the second vaccine to be approved in the uk, after pfizer—biontech's was given the green light earlier this month. it's also been announced that the immunisation campaign will now shift to giving as many people as possible their first dose of vaccine, with a longer gap before the second dose is given. the uk has 100 million doses of the oxford—astrazeneca vaccine on order — that's enough for 50 million people. compared to other vaccines being developed, it's cheap, easy to produce and can be stored in a fridge. since being designed in april, it has been through large—scale clinical trials involving thousands of volunteers. the boss of astrazeneca said it was an important day for millions of people in the uk and said his company would not profit from supplying the vaccine. tweeting this morning, the prime minister borisjohnson said the approval was "fantastic news" and a "triumph for british science", saying, "we will move to vaccinate as many people "as quickly as possible."

january the 4th is when the health secretary said the roll—out of the oxford vaccine will start. matt hancock said it was a really significant moment in the fight against coronavirus. it was a really significant moment the vaccine is the way out. and the approval of the oxford astrazeneca vaccine brings forward the data which is going to bring this pandemic to an end. so it's good news for everybody watching, the whole country. this is a real british success story. it's a combination of the science at oxford university, the uk vaccines network, the government funding through the national institute for health research, who have done an absolutely excellent job. 0bviously astrazeneca, and the nhs. and so this is a really good news this morning,

that the vaccine has notjust been approved, but also that they find that the immunity to the disease comes after around a fortnight after the first dose, which means that we can really accelerate the number of people who get protected. the chief executive of astrazeneca, pascal soriot, has also given his reaction to the news, praising the developers for the efforts to get to this stage. he said he was working with the british government to keep up with demand for the vaccine. well, the government target is an ambitious target handling or working with them to define this. i would like to leave it to the government to decide, actually, what they want to communicate and the speed at which they want to vaccinate people, but we certainly will be with them to make sure we have a very effective vaccination programme. again, you know, it is a challenge, a challenging exercise, of course. the good news with this vaccine,

and i want to say it very clearly, because it's very important for your listeners to understand this, the dosage regimen is one dose, followed by a second dose one, two, three months later. and the good news with this is we are going to be able to inject a lot of people with one dose very quickly, provide them with a reasonably good level of protection, until they get a second dose later, two to three months later, and that will enable us to protect many more people, because we can wait two to three months for the second dose. we can go to 2 million. and when i said ambitious, i did not mean to say that it was not achievable, i meant to say that the government is committed to vaccinating people as quickly as we can actually physically do it in a good manner, because it's important to protect as many people as possible. and, again, with one dose, we will be able to inject millions of people in the first quarter, starting in january. january, we will already possibly be vaccinating several million people and, by the end of the first quarter,

we are going to be in the tens of millions already. 0ur belief at this point is that this vaccine should be effective against the variant, the variant that has been identified in the uk. 0ur colleagues at oxford are working very, very intensively with the nhs to test that and confirm this, but our belief is that the vaccine will work. if we need, at some point, because a new variant emerges that turns out to be more resistant, if we need to develop a new vaccine, we can, but it will, of course, take a little bit of time to develop it. professor andrew pollard is leading the oxford trial. he explained more about the decision by the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation to give people two doses — with the second dose up to 12 weeks after the first. essentially, what they're saying is, quite rightly, that if you give a first dose to as many people

as possible, and you don't have to give the second dose just a few weeks later, then you can vaccinate a lot more people in the first phase, stop them getting severely ill and going to hospital. you do still need the second dose. but if you delay that, you could have vaccinated a lot more people are protected and before you get to the second dose, which, we think, is important for durability. but it's getting that impact as early as possible. because vaccine impact is about the timeliness of vaccination and the coverage, the number of people you can vaccinate as soon as possible. i don't think really now is the moment to rest. it's a moment to celebrate and have some optimism about where we have got to today, and moving forwards. but we have to keep up this battle against the virus. not just here, but across all of the vaccine developers. my colleagues in the hospital today are facing the horror of this virus this morning. this really isn't the moment to relax our efforts to try to get more information about how we can

best prevent it. professor andrew pollard. we can speak to the former government chief scientific adviser sir david king. hejoins me now from cambridge. good morning to you. professor pollard, talking about this being a moment to celebrate. you must agree with that? of course, it is a moment for celebration. and what we now need from government is a very clear and explicit strategy for vaccine roll—out. we have heard that it is quite feasible that over the next six months we can get a significant roll—out of this vaccine, which is critically important. but let me just remind everyone where we are with the disease at the moment. london and the south—east have been under tier 4for 13, london and the south—east have been under tier 4 for 13, 1a days now. and i'm afraid tierfor is not

containing the spread of the virus. hospitals in london are now being overstretched and we believe in two weeks' time they will be beyond being overstretched. so the situation is really very, very critical throughout the country. and i say throughout the country because we know that the new strain of this virus is spreading rapidly across the country as a whole. 0nce virus is spreading rapidly across the country as a whole. once again, we really would like to see government take he action rapidly, 110w. government take he action rapidly, now. it is vitally necessary, i believe, for a nationwide lockdown with immediate effect. as the vaccine comes into play, remember that the more people have the virus and are spreading the virus in the country, the more others will need to be vaccinated before we are in a safe place. it could well be that we need something like 80% — 90% vaccination in order to achieve what

we call herd immunity. ifi canjust jump we call herd immunity. ifi canjust jump in, at what rate would people have to be vaccinated in order to achieve that? we were talking about achieve that? we were talking about a couple of million per week, aren't we? we are talking about a couple of million a week. let's not forget, modellers from the sage modelling subgroup have estimated that under a national tm aggro four, another 100,000 people could die before the end ofjune 2021. —— a national tier 1l end ofjune 2021. —— a national tier 4. we have had 70,000 deaths so far. hundreds of thousands of others can go on to suffer from long covid. hundreds of thousands of others can go on to sufferfrom long covid. and this is an awful suffering they are going through. so, while we need to celebrate the arrival of the vaccine, the government must not ta ke vaccine, the government must not take its focus off the business of find, test, trace, isolate and support. what we need to see is that a lockdown is introduced. and don't

undo the lockdown until we do find every new case, test, trace, isolate those people and support them. support them, for example, in new york, people are given hotel accommodation and are supported in hotels, fed and given medical supplies in the hotels, to see that eve ryo ne supplies in the hotels, to see that everyone is fully supported when they are in lockdown. in order to bring it under control, we need all of these measures now. yes. just to bring you back to the vaccine, my understanding is that an initial dose protects people. it may not stop them from becoming ill, but it will stop them from becoming gravely ill. that is the real fear, will stop them from becoming gravely ill. that is the realfear, and it has been throughout this pandemic, hasn't it, of the nhs becoming overwhelmed with gravely ill people. and if this vaccine can be got out quickly enough, that very serious situation should be prevented? when

would it be prevented, though? what iam would it be prevented, though? what i am saying is that it isn't only the people over 80 who are dying at the people over 80 who are dying at the moment, and are suffering terribly from long covid. it's a vast proportion of our population. what i am actually saying is that we need all of the measures in place to rapidly get rid of this disease from the country. vaccination is one of them. are we going to roll out the army? when i was helping the government to control foot—and—mouth disease across our agricultural sector in the 2000s, we had the army at our disposal. that was critical. let's bring in the army to run the test, trace and isolate system as well as helping the gps, hospitals, to roll—out the vaccination. well as helping the gps, hospitals, to roll-out the vaccination. the army is being brought in in schools. the army is being brought in in

schools, that is really important. let's also remember that while we are shutting down in the near future, particularly for older children, those children who can't work from home need to be able to attend school along with vulnerable and key worker children. we need to see that all of this is put in place. and, really, we need to hear from government to the details of this. today, the independent sage is putting out a five sector strategy for managing this outbreak as we move forward in time. that will also not only deal with the health of the nation, but enable the economy to ta ke nation, but enable the economy to take off again, because once we have isolated everyone with the disease from the rest of us, the rest of us can go about our normal business. good to talk to you as always. thank you so much. sir david king, former chief government scientific adviser. thank you very much. we can speak now to our science correspondent, rebecca morelle.

hard to ha rd to overstate hard to overstate how big a day this is with the oxford astrazeneca vaccine being given approval. just explain to people about the doses, the fact that there is going to be a longer period than anticipated between the first dose on the second dose. explain the thinking behind that. this is interesting. because dosing has been brought up before with this particular vaccine. research published in the lancet earlier this month actually looked ata earlier this month actually looked at a regimen where you gay people half a dose, followed by a full dose. and that seemed to be more effective in terms of protecting people, compared with giving two full doses. there wasn't very much a data associated with that. so, the medical regulators have gone with the two full dose regime to get people vaccinated. but what is different with this is the amount of time between the two doses. the second dose can now follow up to 12 weeks later, which is quite a big 93p- weeks later, which is quite a big gap. at the idea behind this is to

get as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible. so, if you can give one dose to lots of people, that does give you some immunity. that means you have some protection against this virus. you do need a second dose later on to give you... i think the durability of the immune response. but the idea is, really, that you can give more people some protection, a decent amount of protection, a decent amount of protection, at an earlier stage. and, of course, with the new variant thatis and, of course, with the new variant that is around at the moment, and the numbers going up in terms of cases, protecting people as soon as you possibly can is really important. it is interesting that they have changed this dosing regime. and, rebecca, we did hear that, almost by accident, they found that, almost by accident, they found that if you give half of the first dose and then the full amount of the second dose you actually get more protection. why are they not rolling it out in that way? i think it was a

question of data. that was only really trialled in quite a small amount of people, compared to the full dose regimes. so more data was needed and it was also not carried out in people over 55. that's the important group, where you start to get more vulnerability to the virus. i think more data will be being gathered in terms of this half dose, and full dose regime. but we haven't got that at the moment. so, the two full doses is what we have gone for. but whether that is changed in the future, that would be up to the medical authorities, the regulators, to decide. thank you very much, our science correspondent rebecca morelle. lawrence young, head of division of cancer studies at the university of birmingham, is a distinguished scientist with an international reputation for his work in the field of human tumour virology. good morning to you, professor

young. presumably, you join in the general upbeat mood with news of the vaccine? ideal, it provides a ray of hope at the end of a very, very challenging year and during a period where we are experiencing the worst of the pandemic. there has been some talk this morning about the new variant strains of coronavirus that we have seen that have spread so rapidly in england. talk us through how effective this vaccine is likely to be in the face of this variant. well, the first thing to say is as we have got a more transmissible form of the virus that is more infectious, it makes suppressing it harder. having said that, everything we know about the variance in terms of their genetics and, of course, as everybody has heard, we are in the front line or being able to sequence the genome of the virus, as its changes, what we know from that is

that even though some changes have occurred in small regions of the virus, this will not affect the way current vaccines work. so, the body's immune system mounts a very strong and broad immune response. and this should not be in any way compromised by the current variance that have arisen in this country and elsewhere. does there have to be a certain proportion of the population thatis certain proportion of the population that is immunised in order to protect against the virus is to mark and is there a likelihood that the virus might then change again? those are two very interesting questions. the first thing to say is that if you have a virus that is more transmissible, a good example of that will be something like measles, that will be something like measles, that means you need to get more of this so—called herd immunity that we hear so much about. we really do need as many people to be vaccinated and protected, so that means that

the roll—out of this vaccine across the roll—out of this vaccine across the entire population is so important. and that probably needs to be ata important. and that probably needs to be at a level nearer to 90% on 70%. so, that is the first thing. the issue about the transmission of the virus is one that we just need to remember that whatever happens with the way that these viruses change, and they could possibly change, and they could possibly change in response to vaccination, the way to stop transmission stays the way to stop transmission stays the same. so, hands, space, face, making sure that if we are inside we are in ventilated areas, that type of approach will block the transmission of any virus. and we need to be very mindful of the need for those restrictions. these are the first base slogans, aren't they, that must be drummed into everybody by now. we keep hearing, professor jung, about the strain on the nhs at the moment, as we go through the

second wave. is this vaccine likely to make a difference to the situation as we see it now? the difficulty is that we are in a perfect storm at the moment, we have increasing hospitalisations, yesterday we saw the largest single daily increase in numbers of cases. of course, we have the additional pressure on the nhs to roll out the vaccine. it really is a perfect storm. i think what we've got to remember is that the vaccines will prevent people from getting sick. the sooner we can roll those out to the most vulnerable in the population, the more protection it will give the nhs because it will stop those individuals from having to be hospitalised. i think this is why it is a bit of a catch—up process. the sooner we can get on and vaccinate the most vulnerable, and vaccinate the most vulnerable, and that is the prioritisation of different risk groups, and do that as soon as possible, then we can

start to see some protection of the nhs. but it is going to take some time. and it is a bit like playing catch—up. it's not going to be easy. we are focused on coronavirus and the nhs. but you are of cancer studies at the university of birmingham. —— you are ahead of cancer studies. how would you assess the way in which this concentration of resources on coronavirus has affected other areas, and affected patients who suffering from other conditions, for example cancer. let me correct you, i am not at birmingham any more, i am at the university warwick. i beg your pardon, i was given a duff steer. we are concerned for different reasons, we have heard about the difficulties associated with the amount of funding that charities, including cancer charities, are receiving. that is having a significant impact on our ability to continue research,

including in leading research on clinical trials of new cancer drugs. these are being very significantly impacted by funding and by the other pressures on the nhs. and of course, the big concern that we have is that we know that many folks who should be screened for cancer are not being screened. and we are building up a massive problem for ourselves and for individuals. and it's of great concern to me and my colleagues in the oncology field that we are really going to have a serious problem with the number of more advanced cancer cases that we are going to see over the next few months, as a consequence of the enormous pressure on the nhs. 0k, very good to talk to you. we have to leave it there. thank you very much indeed. millions more people in england are expected to be moved into the highest level of coronavirus restrictions after a record rise in infections. the health secretary, matt hancock, will make the announcement in the house of commons this afternoon. a major incident has been declared by nhs

and emergency services in essex, because of growing demand on hospitals and on social care services. anisa kadri has more. the centre of southampton empty, after the toughest coronavirus restrictions came in on boxing day. today, the government's expected to announce more areas of england will enter tier 4. and there's also talk of whether four tiers is enough. we don't take these tiering decisions lightly. with this new variant growing rapidly, and it's now the majority new cases, it is very important that we keep people safe, and that we protect the nhs, which, as you know, is under significant pressure. yesterday, the uk announced another 53,135 covid cases, a record daily figure. it's partly down to a christmas lag in reporting, but also reflects the fast—spreading new variant of the virus. and nhs staff say they're at risk

of becoming overwhelmed. the peaks not going to come for maybe two weeks from now, three weeks from now? and the big thing for us will be — we've had the christmas social mixing. question is if people will do the same thing at new year, and then we'll have another peak further up. more than 21,000 people are being treated in hospitals for covid across the uk. in wales, they're dealing with their highest level of patients now. this is something that's taking a real toll on the staff. at some point, we will sit down and take stock. i don't think we've fully absorbed the effects on us all psychologically. but at the minute we're very focused that we've got a job to do, we've got several months more of the winter to get through, and we're really still in the eye of the storm. in northern ireland, hospitals say although under pressure, they are coping. and in scotland, people are being urged to stay at home over new year as cases hit a record high. in romford, patients had to be

treated in parked ambulances outside the queen's hospital. essex has declared a major incident, enabling the county to seek further support from the government to address the pressures. meanwhile, the prime minister is expected to decide whether to keep secondary schools shut, in order to try to reduce coronavirus transmission. nhs providers, the group representing hospitals and other health trusts in england, want to see the government put more areas under tier 4 restrictions today, concerned that services are being stretched to their limits. as many pin their hopes on the vaccine for normality to return, trying to keep cases down through the winter remains a priority. anisa kadri, bbc news. borisjohnson is calling on mps to back his post—brexit trade deal ahead of a vote in the house of commons later. parliament has been recalled for the vote, a day before the uk will fully cut ties with the european union. we can discuss this further with maddy thimont jack,

an associate director on the brexit team at the institute for government — a non—partisan think tank. good morning to you. well, this is so late in the day, isn't it? i guess it is happening, but it leaves not very much time for scrutiny. exactly. essentially, what parliament has been asked to do is rubber—stamp the deal. this agreement was reached on 24th of december, christmas eve. and then we didn't see the full text until the 26th of december. we are talking about a long and complex trade agreement that is over 200 pages long. the idea that mps and peers have really a chance to get their heads around what is in the deal and what the applications are, i think it's just not realistic. it's also worth saying that what mps are actually being asked to look at today's legislation to implement the deal in domestic law. that is an 80 page bill which, again, was only published yesterday. so, i think there is a real concern that there

hasn't been enough time for scrutiny. but because the clock is ticking on the transition period ends tomorrow night, there is no real alternative at this stage. you have almost pre—empted my second question, which was that, despite everything you say, we sort of know that this bill is going to go through. yeah, exactly. we have seen that the majority of conservative mps have come out in support of the deal, we know that keir starmer, for labour, is backing the deal. we were expecting quite a few rebellions on the labour benches, but ultimately we know that the prime minister has the numbers in the commons. if we look to the house of lords, the government does not have a majority. but at the same time we know there isa but at the same time we know there is a majority against no—deal. that is a majority against no—deal. that is the other option at this stage. although peers will be very unhappy about how quickly this is done, there are some amendments mentioned in the house of lords saying that, i still do think that we will see the legislation get through. i'm going to draw this to a close for the

moment. please don't go away. we do wa nt to moment. please don't go away. we do want to talk to you again very shortly. we are going to cross right now to the weather. thank you very much. still cold out there at the moment, —8 in parts of western scotland, even as far south as the south coast of england, —2. to go with the frost, some ice around, especially where you have the showers. these are the showers at the moment, snow in the north—west of scotland, sleet and snow flurries through northern ireland and north wales, approaching an area of rain towards devon and cornwall. that will turn to snow across the higher ground of the moors. rain for the channel islands. away from that, mostly having a dry and bright today. it is going to be and bright today. it is going to be a fine winters day for the vast majority. a covering of snow still possible into the afternoon, spreading down as far south as the trossachs and the grampians. into northern ireland in western wales, rain along coastal levels turning to snow in land. heavy rain across the

south—west. that, as it pushes its way across the english channel, could turn to snow across the downs briefly, leaving some icy conditions into tonight, more showers to the west, a cold and frosty night once again. see you soon.

welcome to viewers in the uk and around the world, as the uk parliament prepares to start debating the post—brexit trade deal struck between the british government and the european union. the prime minister borisjohnson will urge mps to "open a new chapter in our national story" by backing the agreement. the deal hammered out with brussels over nine tortuous months sets out a new business and security relationship between the uk and its biggest trading partner. labour leader sir keir starmer — who campaigned against brexit — has said the "thin" agreement does not do enough to protectjobs,