The number of people in England who have received two doses of a Covid vaccine has passed half a million, according to the latest NHS data. 

A total of 14,318,115 Covid-19 vaccinations took place in England between 8 December and 17 February, according to provisional NHS England data, including first and second doses. Of this number, 13,817,914 were the first doses while 500,201 were a second dose.

Only 55 per cent of Black people in England in their 70s had received a Covid-19 vaccine by last week compared to 86 per cent of white people in the same age range, a study has shown.

Among those from South Asian backgrounds, 73 per cent of people aged 70-79 had been vaccinated by 11 February, according to a study by OpenSafely, run by the University of Oxford and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Simon Stevens, chief executive of the National Health Service in England, on Monday said higher rates of vaccine hesitancy are a “real concern” and that a huge effort was being made to overcome it.

Here’s a graphic showing the number of positive Covid-19 cases in the UK per 1,000 tests, by Statista

Pakistan has said it expects to receive 2.8 million doses of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine on 2 March and will begin vaccinating over-60s.

The country began its immunisation programme this month, vaccinating frontline health workers with 500,000 doses of Sinopharm’s vaccine donated by China.

It will receive the AstraZeneca doses via the Covax initiative, which is supplying vaccines to poorer countries.

“I can confirm according to the information we’ve been given that we will receive 2.8 million doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine as part of the COVAX,” health minister Faisal Sultan told a news conference.

Pakistan has recorded more than 550,000 coronavirus cases and over 12,000 deaths.

Four major studies into the long-term impact of coronavirus will be boosted by £18.5 million of Government funding as researchers attempt to dig into the causes and potential treatments for the “debilitating” symptoms some are left with long after infection. Joe Middleton reports:

An advert featuring black and British-Asian celebrities is set to air across commercial television to encourage ethnic minority groups to accept a vaccine, writes Jon Sharman:

More “surge” testing is being introduced in England after a further discovery of the South African variant of Covid-19.

The mutation has been found in Leeds, prompting the Department of Health to announce additional testing and genomic sequencing in a bid to detect cases and control the spread.

It is the latest area of the country to have targeted testing set up.

People in the LS8 postcode, including parts of Harehills and the area just north of Easterly Road where the variant was found, are being “strongly encouraged” to take a test when offered, whether or not they have symptoms.

Earlier this week the department said targeted testing regimes would be set up in parts of Norfolk, Southampton and Woking in Surrey.

Efforts in Manchester to track down examples of the more transmissible Kent variant were also being expanded following deployment of testing teams last week.

The Prince of Wales has said it is a tragedy not everyone is benefitting from the Covid vaccine.

At an online conference aimed at encouraging take-up among minority communities, Prince Charles praised the “extraordinary achievements” of the medical experts whose efforts “must rank as one of the greatest scientific achievements of our time”.

He also highlighted the vaccine’s benefits, saying: “It is clear that the virus has affected all parts of the country, and all sections of society – but it is also clear that there are particular challenges faced in particular sections of our society, especially in some ethnic minority communities.

“What saddens me even further is to hear that those challenges are being made even worse by the variable uptake of the vaccines which finally offer us a way out of the suffering of the past year.”

Scotland has recorded 57 more deaths from coronavirus and 685 positive tests in the past 24 hours, Nicola Sturgeon has said.

It brings the death toll of people who died after testing positive within 28 days to 6,885.

Public Health Wales reported another 14 deaths, taking the total in the country since the start of the pandemic to 5,189.

The second dose of Pfizer’s vaccine could be delayed in order to cover all priority groups as the first one is highly protective, two Canada-based researchers said in a letter published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The vaccine had an efficacy of 92.6% after the first dose, Danuta Skowronski and Gaston De Serres said, based on an analysis of the documents submitted by the drugmaker to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

In its response, Pfizer said alternative dosing regimens of the vaccine had not been evaluated yet and that the decision lay with the health authorities.