As of January 18, 2023, Portugal had the highest COVID-19 vaccination rate in Europe having administered 272.78 doses per 100 people in the country, while Malta had administered 258.49 doses per 100. The UK was the first country in Europe to approve the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine for widespread use and began inoculations on December 8, 2020, and so far have administered 224.04 doses per 100. At the latest data, Belgium had carried out 253.89 doses of vaccines per 100 population. Russia became the first country in the world to authorize a vaccine - named Sputnik V - for use in the fight against COVID-19 in August 2020. As of August 4, 2022, Russia had administered 127.3 doses per 100 people in the country.

The seven-day rate of cases across Europe shows an ongoing perspective of which countries are worst affected by the virus relative to their population. For further information about the coronavirus pandemic, please visit our dedicated Facts and Figures page.

Analysis of the UK human vaccine market showing a 14% consumption decline to 1.5K tons in 2024, with forecasted slow growth of +0.7% CAGR through 2035. The market relies heavily on imports from Belgium, France, and the US, while domestic production remains limited.

According to Edward J. Edwardes, it was in the armies of Europe where the importance of revaccination was discovered. In the pre-vaccination era, smallpox was not a serious problem in the army, as the majority of recruits had already contracted the virus during their childhood and had therefore developed an immunity to it. In the decades that followed widespread vaccination, army doctors began to notice that many servicemen were contracting smallpox in adulthood; the reason for this was that vaccination in infancy did not guarantee lifelong immunity from the virus, and the protection would wear off in adulthood. With this discovery, armies in Europe began to revaccinate all recruits upon entering the army. Britain slow to adopt revaccination When compared with the German states in the first half of the nineteenth century, Britain was much slower in adopting compulsory vaccination. The same was true in the army, as the German states began revaccinating all new recruits when the problem was first realized in the 1830s, whereas Britain did not introduce mandatory revaccination in the army until 1858. Although only Home Army figures are available in this time, we can see that the smallpox trends of the eighteenth century were repeating in the British Army, with waves of the disease coming at regular intervals. After 1858, the smallpox death rate decreases considerably in the Home Army, except during the Great Pandemic of the 1870s, and there were little-to-no deaths in the final years of the 1800s. Even slower progress in the navy and abroad While the Home Army brought its smallpox death rate down considerably by revaccinating all recruits, the impact was not as strongly felt in the Royal Navy, nor by the British Forces in India. Revaccination also applied to these armies, however their environments did not allow for the change to take hold as quickly; this was due to the nature of the navy, where recruits lived in close quarters with limited sanitation methods, and the fact that smallpox was a serious and endemic problem throughout the Indian subcontinent until the 1970s. The smallpox death rate in the British Navy was brought down considerably by the end of the century. Data suggests that the disease was likely also in decline among soldiers in India.

As of June 13, 2023, there have been almost 768 million cases of coronavirus (COVID-19) worldwide. The disease has impacted almost every country and territory in the world, with the United States confirming around 16 percent of all global cases.

COVID-19: An unprecedented crisis Health systems around the world were initially overwhelmed by the number of coronavirus cases, and even the richest and most prepared countries struggled. In the most vulnerable countries, millions of people lacked access to critical life-saving supplies, such as test kits, face masks, and respirators. However, several vaccines have been approved for use, and more than 13 billion vaccine doses had already been administered worldwide as of March 2023.

The coronavirus in the United Kingdom Over 202 thousand people have died from COVID-19 in the UK, which is the highest number in Europe. The tireless work of the National Health Service (NHS) has been applauded, but the country’s response to the crisis has drawn criticism. The UK was slow to start widespread testing, and the launch of a COVID-19 contact tracing app was delayed by months. However, the UK’s rapid vaccine rollout has been a success story, and around 53.7 million people had received at least one vaccine dose as of July 13, 2022.