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'Covid is going to just become a cold': Vaccine pioneer says virus will get weaker all the time as Whitty says every child is going to get it, unless they are jabbed

  • Professor Dame Sarah Gilbert said Covid unlikely to mutate into deadlier variant
  • Said viruses tend to 'become less virulent as they circulate' through population
  • Professor Whitty says all schoolchildren will come into contact with Covid
  • England's chief medical officer warned all who remain unjabbed will be infected


'It's just a question of how long it's going to take to get there and what measures we're going to have to take to manage it in the meantime.'

 

The 59-year-old led the team at Oxford University's Jenner institute which created the lifesaving Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine, the most widely distributed jab in the world.

 

Dame Sarah also revealed she is struggling to get funding to help prevent future pandemics.

 

 


The scientist, who specialises in the development of jabs against emerging viruses, said urgent investment was needed to prevent other infectious diseases spreading around the world.

 

She said: 'We're still trying to raise funds to develop other vaccines that we were working on before the pandemic, against diseases that have caused outbreaks in the past and will cause outbreaks in the future.

 

'We are being financially supported for our ongoing work against Covid... but when we try to return to projects we were working on before coronavirus we're still trying to get funding.'

 

Meanwhile, she said the very rare blood clots linked to the AstraZeneca jab have not been seen in the same rates in other parts of the world.

 

She also suggested that primary work on a tweaked vaccine to combat the Beta variant of the virus only gave a 'slightly better' immune response than the original vaccine, when given as a third dose to people who had already had two jabs of the AstraZeneca vaccine, but the data is still being collected.  

 

In June, then health secretary Matt Hancock said the Government was in commercial discussions with the pharmaceutical giant over the variant vaccine.

 

Dame Sarah was also asked which of her titles she is most proud of, and said: 'Professor, definitely.' 

 

The scientist's comments came as England's chief medical officer said almost all unvaccinated children will become infected with Covid at some point and said the others would get it 'sooner or later', insisting that vaccines will cut that risk. 




Read More: Daily Mail

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