Ms Bingham was appointed chair of the UK‘s Vaccine Taskforce for Covid-19 in May and reports directly to the Prime Minister on the progress of a coronavirus vaccine, which experts say is key to controlling the pandemic.

The taskforce, which Ms Bingham says was the ‚brainchild of Sir Patrick Vallance‘ — Number 10‘s chief scientific adviser, is at the forefront of putting plans in place to get the UK population vaccinated.