Britain began vaccinating its population with the Covid-19 shot developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca, touting a scientific “triumph” that puts it at the vanguard of the West in inoculating against the virus.

Britain, which is rushing to vaccinate its population faster than the United States and the rest of Europe, is the first country to roll out the Oxford/AstraZeneca shot. It rolled out the Pfizer and Germany's BioNTech vaccine last year, according to Reuters.

Dialysis patient Brian Pinker, 82, was the first to get the Oxford/AstraZeneca shot at Oxford University Hospital, just a few hundred metres from where the vaccine was developed.

“I am so pleased to be getting the COVID vaccine today and really proud that it is one that was invented in Oxford,” Pinker, a retired maintenance manager who has been having dialysis for kidney disease, said.