The decision by the Amsterdam based European Medicines Agency to approve the Moderna coronavirus vaccine on Wednesday is a boost to the slow-starting Dutch vaccination programme, officials say.

‘This second coronavirus vaccine gives us an extra resource to end the pandemic,’ Ton de Boer of the Dutch medicines assessment council, said.

The Netherlands has ordered 6.2 million doses of the Moderna vaccine, enough to vaccinate some three million people.

In the Netherlands, the Moderna vaccine will be used primarily to vaccinate vulnerable elderly people and family doctors, and the first jabs are likely to be given at the end of the month.