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Vaccine passports are nothing new, look up yellow fever. You have to be able to prove your have had the vaccine for yellow fever if traveling from an endemic area into somewhere like India
Young healthy folks will be unable to go abroad,
Until a few months later
The implications of many nhs staff leaving is extremely worrying.
My best friend (in nhs) has been working for 2 years without a holiday (just the odd day off here and there), mostly 6 days a week now and often 7 days a week. Also coping with school aged children and a rotten home life. I'm worried she will just burn out. 2 colleagues in her team are leaving as soon as they are 55. Her job has been completely changed from OT (the out patients part of the hospital is now a morgue) to nursing elderly patients who've have operations and treatments. (She had to retrain). In her words mopping up S**t, sick and other bodily fluids.
Oh and she's over 50 and if you 'younguns' think that someone in her age group doesn't deserve a holiday more than you - well shame on you.
Anyway I'll leave before I say something I regret.
Why would you not want the jab especially if you’re a carer?
Our manager unexpectedly went down the vaccine conversation route in this mornings team dial in when checking on our general welfare amid lockdown.
Apparently staff in other teams have said they don't want the vaccine due to fears over safety, supposed lack of testing due to speed of development and the social media rumours over fertility.
I guess this is a big concern as our base office is Leicester, so it's been in permanent lockdown of some sort or another through last year, high number of BAME staff at greater risk.
I may have quoted a lot of TiReds thoughts on the subject. No one said they were against having it, one of my colleagues did her volunteer vaccination training last weekend, and one kicked off about being demoted from Band 6 as her medical condition was now lower priority.
Young healthy folks will be unable to go abroad,
Until a few months later
From Omnicalculator, there is currently no distinction between anyone between 18 and 49 (excluding health conditions and NHS)
"Given a vaccination rate of 3,056,416 a week and an uptake of 70.6%, you should expect to receive your first dose of vaccine between 04/05/2021 and 24/06/2021.
You should then get your second dose by between 27/07/2021 and 16/09/2021."
Second dose plus 3 weeks means this population wont be getting their passport until October.
As this is the age people will have kids under 18, October half term is going to be a money gouging blowout!
Oh, and boomer is a generally accepted definition of someone "...born between 1946 and 1964. They're currently between 57-75 years old" or thereabouts, not an insult.
Sincerely, a millenial. (born between 1981 and 1996)
Oh and she’s over 50 and if you ‘younguns’ think that someone in her age group doesn’t deserve a holiday more than you – well shame on you.
No, her age doesnt mean she deserves a holiday more than me.
Although some sort of preferential treatment as a reward for the NHS staff who have gone through hell this last year I would be wholeheartedly behind, irrespective of age.
Vaccine passports are nothing new, look up yellow fever. You have to be able to prove your have had the vaccine for yellow fever if traveling from an endemic area into somewhere like India
Pretty sure there's only one yellow fever vaccine, which provides long lasting protection and is close to 100% effective. So quite a different situation to the Covid vaccines.
An additional 1.7million to shielding!
Oh and she’s over 50 and if you ‘younguns’ think that someone in her age group doesn’t deserve a holiday more than you – well shame on you.
Anyway I’ll leave before I say something I regret.
Why would someone over 50 be any more deserving of a holiday? Genuine question?
your first dose of vaccine between 04/05/2021 and 24/06/2021.
You are assuming the rollout of first vaccine will continue at current rate to hit that target.
In reality to vaccinate 3m a week beyond the first 9 groups requires a doubling of capacity due to second jabs also being required
The 1st dose vaccination numbers for 14&15th are 19% lower than the same days last week.
Potentially they are starting to stockpile so they have sufficient doses for those requiring 2nd doses after the initial 12 week period.
It was 99% of doses were being to first jabs, but that will need to change to a 50/50 split unless supply increases dramatically. The Moderna vaccine supplies arent due until April so expect the flow of new people being vaccinated to slow down.
Second dose plus 3 weeks means this population wont be getting their passport until October.
So a few months later.
Im in that age bracket, bearing in mind the number of deaths involved so far. I’m ok with waiting for a vaccine passport.
Why would someone over 50 be any more deserving of a holiday? Genuine question?
You are misunderstanding what she is saying, I think.
She means: As an NHS worker she deserves a holiday. Why should the fact that she is over 50 mean that she doesn't deserve it.
Well, got my jab next booked for Monday. All done via a link in a text message. Booked it at the same place as my mum had hers in the hope they are doing the Pfizer there still due to having the refrigeration facilities they have. I'll still be happy to have the AZ one though!
Not sure why I've got it so fast? I'm only 52, a carer but not in a care home situation.
I do qualify for the flu jab too in the past due to neurosurgery I've had but no idea how that means I qualify for the flu jab, let alone the Covid vaccine?
Edit, reading fail
^^ Yeah, mum's had the first about 5 weeks back.
If nothing else it'll mean I'll be able to hold my partners hand on our Sunday walk at some point in the future.
Not sure why I’ve got it so fast? I’m only 52, a carer but not in a care home situation.
Carers are in cohort 6
^^ I just assumed carers (as in care homes etc) were prioritised rather than those in the informal role.
Nope.. you have said along you look after your old dear, doesn't need to be in a care home setting. That defo counts as a carer for group 6 criteria.
Well, I'm very grateful for getting it that's for sure. I was expecting it on March or April.
Im assuming the idea is you get it to prevent you falling ill and not being able to look after your dependent, rather than to prevent transmission to them.
Which makes sense, but at same time surely the same arguement could be made for any single parent?
Care “home “ staff group 1. Home informal cares group 6 - get it in your arm 👍
Tp - there is already a study with Oxford showing reduced transmission. MRNA expected to be even more so, just no proof yet.
Tp – there is already a study with Oxford showing reduced transmission. MRNA expected to be even more so, just no proof yet.
That's great news if so.
Here's a question for those in the know. My 75 mum has just had the pfizor jab and she seem to think that once she's had her 2 doses she'll be less at risk than me (currently unvaccinated). She basically thinks the worst shed get would be 'a bit of a cold
I was under the impresdion it would probably stop an old person from going to hospital, but they'd quite possibly suffer a fairly nasty illness and are still more at risk than a young healthy person
I'm not sure I want to break this news to her though if true, she's been waiting for a jab for 12 months!!
Unpaid carers are a current target for vaccination… I half heard it on the radio today.
Booked it at the same place as my mum had hers in the hope they are doing the Pfizer there still due to having the refrigeration facilities they have.
Makes little difference at our hub, they inject what they get sent. Some days Pfizer, some days AZ.
I expect you're right mate, I'll be more than happy to get either.
The 2 centre are about the same distance away so it was just a handy way of deciding which to go to. In truth I could have just flipped a coin im sure.
My day is complete....
There's a bell end vaccine sceptic keeps posting his bile on the local council's Covid related FB posts. Tonight he's linked to the ONS report showing that reported adverse effects (bit fluey, under the weather) from the vaccine are about 3-4 in every 1000, and is not happy that I feel that this undermines his argument somewhat 🤣
Nope.. you have said along you look after your old dear, doesn’t need to be in a care home setting. That defo counts as a carer for group 6 criteria.
Remember you have been exemplary in your actions to isolate yourself.
Most informal carers probably unable or unwilling to do the same.
Protecting them (even if they are vaccinated there is still a chance) gets us as a country some benefit.
Plus if you got ill, who provides your mother care temporarily? Across the whole population that’s a lot of emergency carers to spawn.
Well, got my jab next booked for Monday. All done via a link in a text message
Me too. I'm 'only' 47. Thought I'd be one of the last. 🤔
Exclusive: Covid lockdown to continue until cases drop below 1,000 a day
A senior Whitehall source said: "For any significant relaxation of lockdown, household mixing and reopening pubs, case numbers have to be in the hundreds, not thousands.
"The numbers are coming down quite fast, but the plan is likely to be high level and set out the tests that have to be met for restrictions to be released. There is real reluctance about committing to specific dates without knowing what the case numbers are doing."
- https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/02/16/covidlockdown-continue-cases-drop-1000-day/
Apart from being the Torygraph it's behind a pay wall
Apart from being the Torygraph it’s behind a pay wall
That's why I quoted the important bit. It being the Torygraph, they might have better sources than others within the current administration.
turns out my 75yr old next door neighbor and his wife refused their vaccines and are deep into the covid conspiracy theories.
Saw him over the hedge as i was putting the bins out last night and made the mistake of asking if he'd had his jab yet...I should have guessed as the last 'conversation' i had with him was an anti mask wearing and lockdown rant a couple of months back.
Another essential More Or Less. Always worth a listen.
BTW does anyone know why the daily vaccination rate starts lowest on Monday and ramps up to max out at the weekend?
Most of the staff manning the COVID site near me are staff from local GP practices, we have to balance still running our practices, some who are short staffed because of outbreaks of COVID or shielding staff, with releasing staff to the COVID site in enough numbers so that we can safely open batch of vaccine (that has to be used in 3 days) and use it completely. Throw into that, that we don't generally know which vaccine we're getting more than a few days out. Most of our deliveries seem to happen on Thursday/Friday and we then have to get the patients lined up, over book to account for DNAs and get the staff motivated to do a couple of extra days work.
turns out my 75yr old next door neighbor and his wife refused their vaccines and are deep into the covid conspiracy theories.
My only issue with that is that they will no doubt both expect hospital treatment when they get horribly ill.
I understand young folks not wanting it, but a 75 year-old refusing the vaccine is just plain dumb..
Shielding extended until end of March.
NickC - do you know why the NHS seem to have recruited & trained thousands of vaccinators, then completely ignored us all?
No doubt it comes down to budgets, contracts and money in the end. I know hundreds who have gone through the whole tortuous NHS professionals recruitment/training/background process to never hear anything again once they are “forwarded to a lead trust for on-boarding”
U.K. coronavirus challenge trial
The first approved trial challenging fit young volunteers against live virus.
There were also 3 care workers near me chatting. They didn’t want the jab but were scared of their boss bullying them into getting it, but many of their colleagues wouldn’t.
This has a simple (ish) solution. No jab, no job as they pose a risk to the clients.
This has a simple (ish) solution. No jab, no job as they pose a risk to the clients
This was done before. Not sure thats actually allowed under employment law
That said, I'm not sure if id want a carer looking after an elderly relative of mine if they hadn't had the jab, especially if evidence is begining to show that it helps prevent transmission.
@tp - it is allowed. You can’t force the jab, but you can make it mandatory for the job. For example I have to have Yellow Fever vaccine.
I just caught up with Monday's xkcd guide to how vaccines work.
I'd pay to see this:
To ensure lasting immunity, doctors recommend destroying a second Death Star some time after the first.
The first approved trial challenging fit young volunteers against live virus.
Influenza has a long history of challenge. Now there is a decent antibody as possible rescue, I'm less concerned, but would not be volunteering myself (too old). Antivirals in particular, have a poor record in challenge studies. But there are some successes. This is an example of an influenza antibody. Needs a big dose
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28807912/
Interesting Guardian article on poverty and Covid
I thought that article would get a response
Maybe because it's been depressingly clear from the start that the poor have been and will continue to be much harder hit by this pandemic. It's partly why I fail to get outraged when I hear about people breaking lockdown rules as we just don't know their background situation and whilst it's not too much hardship for the cosy, middle classes with family homes/gardens to stay home there are millions out there dealing with much worse home lives.
I thought that article would get a response
I was sleeping!
It really highlights the impact of long term socioeconomic inequalities and a complete lack of understanding of how this has impacted those groups, all squarely resting on government policies in the last 10, 20, 30, years. And don't get me started on track and trace.
You'd think constituency MPs and the press would have been banging this drum louder to push the government to take more effective action. When Hunt starts looking like the voice of pragmatic reason something is wrong.
The fact that these communities have been abandoned by government and have no choice but to break the guidelines to get by, then reinforces their alienation with the system and encourages some to deliberately break the guidelines.
Good news on the BBC
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-56098313
There has been a "strong decline" in levels of coronavirus infections in England since January, say scientists tracking the epidemic.
Imperial College London's React study found infections have dropped by two-thirds across England since lockdown began, with an 80% fall in London.
Time to use the parachute analogy again, I think.
When they lifted lockdown v1 we were in a similar situation. The London R rate was very low but in the regions it was much higher. I'd like to think we won't make the same mistake again but sadly I'm not convinced.
Predictably The Daily Hate is calling for accelerated re-opening. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it etc.
Rates are still high in a few places, need to be driven right down everywhere, not just in 90% of the country. Still think we need a fortnight of 'mega-lockdown' at the end of this 'fairly relaxed lockdown', with Australia-style enforced restrictions/curfews, to push rates down to the absolute minimum. Obviously not much fun, but we experienced the alternative last year, which was the virus re-seeding itself pretty rapidly after lockdown was eased. With the more transmissible strains (and one which potentially renders vaccines less effective), then the virus has the ability to bounce back more swiftly.
ah, you are hilarious martinhutch.
When they lifted lockdown v1 we were in a similar situation. The London R rate was very low but in the regions it was much higher. I’d like to think we won’t make the same mistake again but sadly I’m not convinced.
rates are pretty much zero here already, maybe we should have a tiered system...
Vaccinations - why is London so far behind the rest of the UK? A simplistic view would be that roll-out would be easier/quicker in an area of more dense population. Or is this because there is a lower number of higher-risk groups?
Obviously not much fun
That's quite the understatement. I have been speaking to various friends, and work colleagues who are really really struggling right now. It's been almost a year, people are hanging on by a thread, myself included.
rates are pretty much zero here already, maybe we should have a tiered system…
Please god, no... some areas have never come out of measures... let's get levels low enough there as well, please.
There needs to be a good look at why though. Leicester for example just won't come down. Hasn't it been in lockdown since just after the summer?
ah, you are hilarious martinhutch.
In what way?
I just want to give us a chance to get track and trace working for us properly. Last year all the massive sacrifices people made in lockdown were squandered because the virus wasn't squashed down in the regions before reopening. Poor Greater Manchester was back in restrictions almost immediately.
The government needs to understand that the economic cost of bungling the reopening process far exceeds the cost of paying people to stay home properly for a short period of very intense restrictions with a view to having a more normal summer. I'm not suggesting lockdown needs to be longer overall.
I live close to Bradford where rates are actually rising right now. Setting policy on national averages is dangerous - we've seen exactly quickly the Kent variant took hold and spread into surrounding regions during the November 'lockdown'.
Admittedly, we should expect vaccination to significantly reduce overall mortality, but the burden of disease in unvaccinated groups is still not trivial. ICUs had plenty of people in their 40s and 50s this time around, and long covid is not to be sniffed at in younger people.
I think Londons age profile is relatively low.
Relaxing restrictions by region should, in theory, help by allowing financial intervention to be better targeted. I'm not convinced any of the Governments are capable of that and I also think it discourages those in the worse areas from behaving responsibly.
Poor Greater Manchester
Yip. We had the dizzy heights of Tier 2 for a week I think it was. Always been in the highest tier. I don't see much being given up at the beginning of March. Maybe some kids back at school. I'd just like to meet a couple of people outside somewhere.
Predictably The Daily Hate is calling for accelerated re-opening. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it etc
Which did get us to autumn - so if all your eggs are in the vaccination basket, that would be enough.
Vaccine resistant strain would ruin this line of thought though.
I'm totally sympathetic to people who are massively ****ed off with even this 'lockdown lite'. Which is why I want it to be the last one. Some groups will be less vulnerable to infection already, but there is easily capacity for another peak to arise before vaccination of adults is complete if we throw the doors open before the virus is at a level low enough to allow contact tracing to be effective.
We need all the ingredients to be working together - initial virus suppression through effective lockdown and vaccination, then further vaccine roll-out, contact tracing, continued mask use on public transport and in other enclosed spaces, plus hygiene measures. All of these have a part to play in helping us get open and hopefully stay open.
Which did get us to autumn
Not quite the same scenario though. Most kids were off school for the entire summer term, so indoor mixing was limited. Even then, rising cases were an issue almost immediately in the north of England. Now we're talking about getting schools open next month with potentially at least a term of full-school attendance, which straight away will move R upwards. Plus we have a more transmissible strain than last year.
So I don't think that vaccination of all adults can be the panacea unless the programme accelerates massively. Will help considerably with mortality among the most vulnerable fairly soon, and I don't know if the government is at the point of thinking 'good enough', and is prepared to accept the consequences of a summer wave in younger groups.
There will be another peak. Most definitely. But, if the vaccine program and any current immunity works for us, then hospital admissions and deaths will stay relatively low. But I fear once we see a rise in cases there will be quick reactions to lock us down again because we have already seen what happens. Frightened of trusting the vaccine?
Please god, no… some areas have never come out of measures… let’s get levels low enough there as well, please.
the entire of devon & cornwall had less cases in the week up to 12th feb than for example bradford alone.
if you zoom in, most of my local area is white at less than three cases.
remind me again why everywhere needs to have the same rules?
Because no area is actually isolated from any other, although I often think otherwise when I cross the Tamar.
(yes Scotland and Wales keep doing their own thing, greater coordination and support would have been preferable there as well though)
remind me again why everywhere needs to have the same rules?
People move about and the second you in Devon and Cornwall open up there will be people making an escape to you from areas with high levels of the virus too. They then potentially spread it around your local area and you are staring at having an outbreak that causes you to be locked down again and possibly put your local health services under strain.
We need to get every part of the country as low as possible before anywhere opens up, then we have a chance to contain any outbreaks and avoid further nationwide lockdowns.
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/cases
Cornwall's latest recorded rate is 61 per 100,000. Not bad, but not there yet. Looking down the list, if Cornwall is ready, so are Camden, Bridgend and Swansea.
Not bad, but not there yet
And where is that? Zero is a mere fantasy. As many have said, once people move around there will be cases. So, is it 10, 20, 24?
I don't know what the capacity of track and trace is right now. The figure needs to be low enough that, in theory, every new case can be aggressively followed up and contacts isolated.
It's hard to find comparable data as to the likely rate in June/July last year, when we reopened (because less testing).
This study:
suggests 25,000 a week were infected, approximately 50 per 100,000. The current stats are based on confirmed cases, so the current actual rate will be higher, by what factor I'm not sure.
I'm also not sure how low rates can be expected to fall during the current set of lockdown restrictions, which have more shops open, and more workplaces, than last time around. There will be a baseline which is a product of the depth and duration of restrictions, plus various geographical and population differences between areas.
Vaccinations – why is London so far behind the rest of the UK? A simplistic view would be that roll-out would be easier/quicker in an area of more dense population. Or is this because there is a lower number of higher-risk groups?
Could be plenty of things. More diverse population with social and cultural reasons to not get the vaccine, higher number of older people in work and no time to get the vaccine, more staff isolation due to increased covid risk so less staff to give vaccines. I know my borough is one of the worst and one of the best is Richmond which is just full of old rich retired people.
Yip. We had the dizzy heights of Tier 2 for a week I think it was.
Move to the City (my partner said) we have restaurants that will serve you any food you want from any country, cinemas, shops, clubs and bars...[sigh]
remind me again why everywhere needs to have the same rules?
People move about and the second you in Devon and Cornwall open up there will be people making an escape to you from areas with high levels of the virus too.
I'm astonished that this question keeps being asked. I understand the frustration of areas with the lowest rates, but people will travel to escape their own restrictions, knowing that the chances of being caught are relatively low.
It's because a lot of people are selfish gits
Some of them are on here
I don’t know what the capacity of track and trace is right now
It's world beating, so literally better than any other track and trace in existence.
I'm surprised you have to ask.
An alternative, some might say more realistic, view, is that seeing as none of the usual media fanbois are bleating on about how successful it is (compare to the vaccine rollout - despite that success having far more to do with it being run by the NHS rather than some chump change crony of the cabinet), so it must be absolute shite.
It’s world beating, so literally better than any other track and trace in existence.
I’m surprised you have to ask.
Yeah, I know. They devolved it to local authorities, didn't they, so it might have got slightly betterer?
I do try to be as optimistic as possible (readers of my posts on this thread may not agree with this!) 🙂