SCIENTISTS have fired up Britain's world-beating new vaccine lab amid fears an unknown “Disease X” will trigger another global pandemic.
Health chiefs have pledged to stay on the front foot after deadly Covid tore through the UK as labs scrambled to design and test a jab in 2020.
The Vaccine Development and Evaluation Centre opens today at the high security Porton Down military science facility near Salisbury.
The UK Health Security Agency says it will soon be able to turn around a lifesaving vaccine for any dangerous new bug within 100 days.
During a lab tour experts told The Sun it is one of the few places in the world that can handle live versions of the deadliest viruses.
Professor Dame Jenny Harries, chief of the agency, said: “We hope we will be better prepared to prevent something escalating to a pandemic.
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“If it is ‘Disease X’ the work that we have done will allow us to deploy a very rapid and slick response.”
The Cabinet Office last week warned there is a 5 to 25 per cent chance of another pandemic in the next five years.
Most Brits have caught Covid-19 in the last 3.5 years and nearly 230,000 have died.
A 2021 report by the Commons Science Committee said the UK vaccine programme was “one of the most stunning scientific achievements in history”.
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It said ministers must make sure laboratories are kept ready to leap into action if faced with the same danger again.
World Health Organisation chiefs warn the next pandemic could be caused by a bacteria, virus or fungus the world has never seen before – a “Disease X”.
It is listed alongside the WHO’s danger list of “priority pathogens” including Ebola, Zika, Lassa fever and Nipah virus.
The UKHSA has already started trialling the world’s first jab for Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever, after a case of the deadly disease was spotted in Britain last year.
Its new vaccine centre has been backed by more than £65million of Government funding and builds on the work done during the Covid pandemic.
More than 200 scientists are working on vaccines to counter everything from mpox to bird flu, which is currently rife in animals across the world.
If it spreads to humans the results could be catastrophic, experts say.
Professor Isabel Oliver, of the UKHSA, said: “With scientific advancement we can detect and control these threats before they impact our lives."
Health Secretary Steve Barclay added: “This state-of-the-art complex will help us deliver on our commitment to produce new vaccines within 100 days of a new threat being identified.”
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