Matt Hancock appears to wipe away tear after watching William Shakespeare get jab on V-Day

'It makes me proud to be British’
April Roach @aprilroach288 December 2020

Matt Hancock appeared to be overcome with emotion as he watched a patient receive the Pfizer Covid vaccine in the largest-scale immunisation programme in the UK’s history.

The first patient was vaccinated just before 7am on Tuesday as hospital hubs across the UK began administering the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 jab on what is being dubbed “V-Day”.

The second person to have the vaccine was 81-year-old William “Bill” Shakespeare, an in-patient on the hospital’s frailty wards from Coventry who is local to his namesake’s county of birth, Warwickshire.

The Health Secretary was on Good Morning Britain, which played a clip of Mr Shakespeare receiving the jab and talking about what it meant to him. 

After it was shown, Mr Hancock appeared to a wipe a tear from his eye as he spoke to presenters Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid. 

“It’s been such a tough year for so many people and there’s William Shakespeare, putting it so simply for everybody, that we can get on with our lives,” said Mr Hancock as he stumbled over his words.

"There’s still a few months to go - I’ve still got this worry, that we can’t blow it now Piers. 

"We’ve still got to get the vaccine to millions of people and so we’ve got to keep sticking by the rules. 

'Bill’ William Shakespeare, 81, receives the Pfizer/BioNTech covid-19 vaccine at University Hospital, Coventry
PA

“But there’s so much work gone into this… it makes me proud to be British”.

Mr Hancock warned that it is still unknown to what extent the Covid vaccine can prevent someone passing on the disease.

Appearing on BBC Breakfast, he said: “We know that this vaccine protects the person who’s been vaccinated.

“What we don’t yet know is the degree to which the vaccine reduces the chance of Margaret (Keenan) passing it on … asymptomatically.

Coronavirus: The first patient in the UK to receive covid-19 vaccine

Margaret Keenan, 90, is applauded by staff as she returns to her ward after becoming the first person in the United Kingdom to receive the Pfizer/BioNtech covid-19 vaccine
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“Now, we think that that transmission risk, as it’s called, is much reduced by being vaccinated. But we need to watch that.”

The Health Secretary added that the Government will continue monitoring data such as Covid cases, hospital admissions and deaths.

“What we hope is that the vaccine programme, by protecting people, will sharply begin to reduce the number of people who end up in hospital and of course the number of people who die, and at that point we’ll be able to start to lift the restrictions.

“But we can’t know that until we’ve got enough people vaccinated that we can see the impact on our hospitals and in terms of deaths and the number of people who die from coronavirus.”

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