A vaccine which hampers transmission could provide a window for reducing anti-Covid measures more quickly.
Dr Gillies O’Bryan-Tear, Past Chair, Policy and Communications, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine, said such a result would be the “holy grail” of vaccine rollout.
He said: “If these vaccines reduce transmission to the extent reported, it will mean that the easing of social restrictions will be enabled sooner, than if we have to wait for herd immunity [which may never in fact be achieved because of insufficient vaccine population coverage].
“That would be the holy grail of the global vaccine rollout, and these data bring us one step closer.”