Turkish scientist confident Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine effective against new UK strain

• Ugur Sahin confident vaccine effective against new strain
• Britain faces isolation after new variant
• WHO says mutation part of pandemic's evolution

BERLIN: The Turkish scientist behind the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine is confident the anti-dote would be effective against the new strain that has been identified in the United Kingdom. 

BioNTech chief executive Ugur Sahin told Bild TV that the company would investigate the new variant in the coming days and that he viewed the matter “with a degree of soberness”.

Sahin spoke after the European Union cleared regulatory hurdles for the vaccine, co-developed with Pfizer, to be rolled out after Christmas. The Turkey-born scientist said he has not been immunised yet but "would like to be". He said it was more important that his employee get the vaccine so they can do his job. 

Explainer: All you need to know about UK's new coronavirus variant

The new variant 

Countries across the globe shut their borders to Britain on Monday due to fears about a new strain of coronavirus, said to be up to 70% more transmissible than the original, causing travel chaos and raising the prospect of food shortages days before Britain is set to leave the European Union.

The discovery of the new strain, just months before vaccines are expected to be widely available, renewed fears about the virus, which killed about 1.7 million people worldwide.

The note of calm from the CEO about the UK mutation echoed the World Health Organization (WHO), which cautioned against major alarm, saying this was a normal part of a pandemic’s evolution.