THE Prime Minister Boris Johnson is set to hold a press briefing later today as a UK vaccine has been officially approved.

At around 5pm tonight, the PM is expected to provide an update on how the vaccination programme will work and our exit from the four-week national lockdown.

It comes as today, the UK became the first country in the world to approve a Covid vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech.

SEE MORE: Covid vaccine approved by UK - Vaccination to start next week 

The jab, which has been shown in studies to be 95 per cent effective and works across all age groups, is expected to be rolled out as early as next week.

The UK has ordered 40m doses of the vaccine, enough to vaccinate 20m people across the four nations.

Around 10m doses will be available for use in the UK shortly for priority groups, including healthcare workers.

Today Dr June Raine, head of regulator MHRA, Professor Sir Munir Pirmohamed, chairman of the Commission on Human Medicine Expert Working Group, and Professor Wei Shen Lim, chairman of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation will give a technical briefing from Downing Street at 10am, covering the Pfizer/BioNTech announcement.