A NEW vaccine could receive approval for use in the UK “within weeks”

If approved, the Novavax jab – to be produced on Teeside – will be the fourth vaccine available to the British public.

Late-stage trials have suggested the jab is 89 per cent effective in preventing coronavirus.

Novavax is also believed to offer protection against the new UK and South African strains.

Professor Paul Heath, the Novavax Phase 3 trial chief investigator, said he believed that vaccines could be adapted “at pace” to target new variants of coronavirus.

He told BBC Radio 4’s Today that the results from his trial were “yet another great step forward for the UK”.

Prof Heath added: “I think the technology we have both with this vaccine, the Novavax technology, and the other vaccines, it is such that they can adapt quickly so we can expect to see, if required, new vaccines or bivalent vaccines, where two different strains are joined together in the one vaccine.

“And that now can be done at pace so that we can keep up with these variants should they prove to be difficult to prevent with the vaccine that we have at the moment.

“We’ve seen for the UK that the UK variant can be successfully prevented with this vaccine, which is great.

“Yes, the South African variant is more difficult and hopefully there will not be more variants but we may expect to see some as time goes on.”