Minor correction. The UK is not the only country employing the delayed second dose strategy. Canada has done so as well, as a way of maximizing and front-loading the benefit of its relatively limited supplies of vaccine, and I believe we started doing so fairly quickly after the UK, before the effectiveness was clear. So whatever answer explains the UK’s willingness to take that risk has to also explain Canada’s similar decision.
Similarly in Slovakia. Our government doesn’t really bother to communicate its strategy clearly; it’s more like “we will send you an SMS when it’s your time to get a shot”, but I got my first shot in mid-April, and am still waiting for the second one.
From my understanding of the Canada situation, it may have been motivated by less access to vaccines initially. The US did very well in terms of getting lots of vaccines soon (https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations) while Canada took about 4 months after the US to really get going. Canada may have been more desperate to prevent Covid (or have their numbers stop lagging the US), and thus been less risk-adverse.
This argument does not work for the UK, as they have been ahead of the US the whole time.
Minor correction. The UK is not the only country employing the delayed second dose strategy. Canada has done so as well, as a way of maximizing and front-loading the benefit of its relatively limited supplies of vaccine, and I believe we started doing so fairly quickly after the UK, before the effectiveness was clear. So whatever answer explains the UK’s willingness to take that risk has to also explain Canada’s similar decision.
Similarly in Slovakia. Our government doesn’t really bother to communicate its strategy clearly; it’s more like “we will send you an SMS when it’s your time to get a shot”, but I got my first shot in mid-April, and am still waiting for the second one.
An important note!
From my understanding of the Canada situation, it may have been motivated by less access to vaccines initially. The US did very well in terms of getting lots of vaccines soon (https://ourworldindata.org/covid-vaccinations) while Canada took about 4 months after the US to really get going. Canada may have been more desperate to prevent Covid (or have their numbers stop lagging the US), and thus been less risk-adverse.
This argument does not work for the UK, as they have been ahead of the US the whole time.
https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/canada/vaccine-panel-says-canada-can-delay-second-dose-of-covid-19-vaccine-if-shortage/ar-BB1cIJaG This article cites the decision being partly justified by limited supplies and how bad things were.