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I won’t apologise for saying that stinks
My understanding is that prisoners who fall into the priority groups will be vaccinated as any other part of the community. It makes sense.
If you are going to prioritise prisoners,
prisoners aren't being prioritised, They've had to wait, we started vaccinating our priority groups the 16th Jan.
Anyway its just my opinion, I don’t need to justify it to anyone that disagrees with me
yep, it's important to never let the facts get in the way of opinions.
The govt have made a decision and refuse to change against all common sense. As usual...
tpbiker
Full MemberNobody is suggesting we kill them. But I certainly don’t think we should be prioritising their health over health of other people.
That's... not how it works. Half the reason for vaccinating teachers is that they're suspected of being a transmission route to others.
I mean, frankly yes I do think we should be prioritising their health over others, because we keep saying that education's a key priority and that getting kids back to school is essential and vaccinating teachers is a pretty obvious and easy way to help that. Sick teachers are disruptive even if they don't get seriously ill and are just off work for a fortnight.
And besides, we've already moved out of the highest risk groups. So when we talk about prioritising one group ie teachers or prisoners over another, we're not talking about snatching a vaccine from a pensioner or doctor any more. We're giving them to people whose risks aren't that heightened now. Including me, a diabetic. Yes I'm at more risk but no I'm not a massively high priority, and that's how it works and how it's supposed to work. And I am not being exposed by my employer.
Prisoners... Well, I get why that's emotive. But the thing is, if you lock someone up you have to do what you can to keep them basically safe, you're taking away the person's ability to do that for yourself. "Everyone must socially distance, ps get in that box with that other dude" And of course prison operation and the wider justice system has been seriously disrupted by the virus, and as long as we keep having significant outbreaks in jails we'll keep putting strain on hospitals. Again, think of it not about "prioritising the prisoner", think of it as "making prisons and the justice system work better and reducing stress on the NHS". Or, hey, keeping prison staff safe so they can keep doing their job.
Ironically prison vaccinations are quite likely to lead to more people getting sent to jail.
Challenging though it is (and my GF runs a primary where they had an outbreak) the jcvi do not recommend teachers get jabs ahead of anyone else because the average age of teachers is relatively low and the numbers of them falling ill also relatively low. Personally I think it would be a much appreciated thing to put teachers ahead of others and I'd be much happier knowing my GF who has had asthma which has hospitalised her on occasion was protected.
However the vulnerable among teaching staff will get it ASAP and as soon as we start trying to make further prioritisations we will slow the overall program.
The idea that people who can work at home are the same priority as a teacher of the same age is still utterly bonkers. No one is making me share a small room for hours on end with a series of groups of 30 other people. No one is saying a teacher in their 50s should take priority over someone in their 70s, or someone with a preexisting condition, but that is not where we are at. They should be vaccinated ahead of those the same age that can chose to minimise the number of indoor long exposure contacts they have. If schools are (rightly) the priority when it comes to opening the country up, and getting contacts going again, then that should feed into the vaccination roll out planning.
I imagine the practicality of prisoners is they will show up one day and jab everyone on site, rather than have them done at the same age related time as the free population.
And if you do them later than "their turn" rather than earlier it only takes one 49 yearold prisoner to die and the guardian handwringers will start bleating.
It would stop the weaponising of it against guards and staff too.
Overall, its a tiny proportion of the country.
(I also would have liked to see teachers done as a priority)
^seems our opinions are already out of date
No 10 has ruled out prioritising prisoners in the next wave of the vaccination programme. According to a report in today’s Times, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation is advising that, in the next phase, people under 50 should be vaccinated by age bands, with no attempt to prioritise key workers. But it is also saying officials should have the option of vaccinating a whole prison in one go. The Times says:
[The JCVI] has accepted that local areas should not be stopped from mass vaccination in institutional settings such as prisons, after complaints that it is impractical to separate out prisoners by age.Although there will not be any formal exemption from the age-based list for prisons, local vaccination teams will be given “more flexibility” to depart from strict priority order to avoid wastage and tackle inequalities of race or class.
But Downing Street said prisoners would not get prioritised, and they would be vaccinated in line with the JCVI recommendations for the whole population (ie by age). “Prisoners won’t be prioritised for vaccines,” the PM’s spokesman said.
They should be vaccinate ahead of those the same age that can chose to minimise the number of indoor long exposure contacts they have.
Give us a break, Our systems are pretty sophisticated, but there's a level at which those sorts of decisions become just pointlessly complex as to be useless. We just need to stick needles in arms as fast as we can. Doing it by age and vulnerability is as good system, as it will by definition pick up folk, regardless of the job they do. We could've chosen to vaccinate by comparative exposure, but the evidence is that more people would die.
rather than earlier it only takes one 49 yearold prisoner to die and the guardian handwringers will start bleating.
Or the death of the accused means a victim of crime does not get justice?
Give us a break
It doesn't have to be you. GPs are not the best option if you want to send teams to institutions to quickly rattle through the adults there... be it a school or a college or a prison... or a university. I'd be calling for University staff to be vaccinated early as well, if they were being told to return to full time face to face learning while others were still being asked to work from home if they can.
prisoners aren’t being prioritised, They’ve had to wait, we started vaccinating our priority groups the 16th Jan.
Did you even read my original post? I said it may not be true but i had heard they were getting priority in 2nd phase, regardless of health issues.
I get the rational for doing it, but my point is the same arguement could be made for teachers..schools are route of transmission etc etc. And I know which group I think are most deserving of vaccination.
And I know which group I think are most deserving of vaccination.
Is it that group that are likely to both spread it more widely and be unable to self isolate effectively and therefore be more vulnerable? I'd imagine that judges juries, lawyers and staff, the police and prison service and the families of those held in prisons will be relived that they're not going to be exposed to a group of likely infections people...
It might not be the most popular, but it's line with the decision to vaccinate the most likely to die.
If we take as a given that breaches to the Coronavirus Act are likely to increase both the chances of catching and spreading Coronavirus perhaps we should prioritise vaccinating those caught in breach of it? We'd obviously need to be careful that this didn't incentivise breaking the law, so we'd also need to increase the punishments too. Perhaps an automatic prison sentence, which would dovetail nicely with prioritising vaccinating prisoners in general. 🙂
And I know which group I think are most deserving of vaccination.
No group is more deserving than another. Need however is something different.
booked my jab for a week today after seeing this
https://www.bradfordhospitals.nhs.uk/2021/02/24/over-60-you-can-book-your-covid-19-vaccination-today/
Good news! I though it was still the over 64 that could chase up a booking. Things are moving quickly…
Not vaccinating teachers is entirely political.
Boris won't ever move away from his "schools are safe" line, and to vaccinate teachers would be to admit his lies.
While I'm in favour of vaccinating teachers early - as much as as a gesture of thanks for all the work that they have put in this last year - there are other frontline jobs with higher infection/death rates that are arguably a higher priority.
As nickc suggested - and I think he has some experience in the area - the practicalities of filtering certain occupations or whatever will be an admin burden the system probably doesn't need. Let's deal with the clinically vulnerable, then the vulnerability by age.
Teachers with underlying health issues, or over 50, or... are being vaccinated
I don't disagree that ALL teachers should be vaccinated, but constantly saying that teachers are not being vaccinated makes it sound like they are being actively denied.
makes it sound like they are being actively denied
No one thinks this. It’s just a straw-man.
Selecting by role (whether it is teachers or prison guards) is trivial. You use their employer and their place of work. As for other groups already targeted based on role, such as professional carers. It is not being rejected on practical concerns really, is it.
Don't they? Why am I raising it then? The language does not reflect that a lot of teachers ARE being vaccinated.
"Not vaccinating teachers is entirely political"
I do not disagree that ALL teachers should be vaccinated
Not vaccinating ALL teachers is entirely political
Unfortunate in the eu that their bickering and comments about the az vaccine have led to only 20% of the supplied doses being used.
Seems the supply issues didn't matter so much now.
Surely that will have an impact on how long it takes them to lift restrictions.
Plus if they have loads unused then can they ship them to places where they will be used rather than let them expire (i.e. mexico or other countries getting badly hit)
Why am I raising it then?
God knows.
rather than let them expire
Who is letting vaccines “expire” ?
The eu will run the risk of letting vaccine doses expire if they don't have people wanting to take them. I don't know what the expiry is but there will be one so if they are not going to use them they could send them somewhere better. African countries etc
What is your source for the idea that the EU won’t use the vaccines? And there are schemes to get vaccines to other parts of the world, which the EU countries are part of (as are we, and at last the USA). Covax is one, and the first deliveries under that scheme have just started.
OK. Is this going to be another example of where the usual suspects jump over someone for having a different opinion?
My wife works in a school. She's worked in several others before this one, and is in contact with several ex-colleagues. I'm not going to link them or their school, but at least one of her ex-colleagues is espousing an opinion that teachers are being actively denied the vaccine (by the refusal to vaccinate all of them) as a strategy to get the herd immunity out through the younger / "not at risk" population. They think any teachers at serious risk are being done; the rest are expendable in the sense that stats say they won't get very ill, and if a few do, well so be it.
I think it's bollocks.
I think the decision is wrong, but I think it's just wrong, not an evil masterplan. I'm not even of the opinion it's being done because they can't backtrack on the schools are safe line. I just think they believe there is greater need elsewhere for now. Again, I think they're wrong and ALL teachers should be on the priority list
But I also think that blanket statements like 'teachers are being denied vaccinations' or 'not vaccinating teachers is a political decision' plays into the hands of conspiracists
Note the key word. I THINK..... you are free to tell me that you think different or why my thinking is wrong, but not to just dismiss it like this place tends to dismiss any alternative thought.
Off the top of my head AZ shelf life is 6 months in the fridge.
When you consider ANYONE involved in the NHS at any level is able to get vaccinated the teacher thing becomes even more silly.
If Teachers rates are low, it’s because the kids have been at home nearly all year!!
Allow Teachers access to the same system HCW use to book jabs. Charity workers have been doing the same. It will be nothing to do with GP surgeries calling people.
What is your source for the idea that the EU won’t use the vaccines?
Theres a few reports hinting at it to varying degrees/reasons
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/25/uk/boris-johnson-vaccine-eu-intl-gbr/index.html
Germany has administered just 15% of its available AstraZeneca shots, according to the health ministry, partly because the country is only administering it to people under 65 and most of those eligible for vaccination at this point are older.
Sorry hadn't put in links
Here is another one
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/25/acceptance-problem-as-most-oxford-covid-jabs-delivered-to-eu-not-yet-used?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other
My partner works in an NHS lab so far away from the public and they wete offered the vaccine ages back.
I think it's obscene that teachers aren't offered it by now.
there we are again....
I think it’s obscene that ALL teachers aren't being offered it
^^ Sorry, that's what I meant.👍
Edit: Have I stepped into the middle of an argument I am not aware of? Not been in the thread much the last few days.
My mates gf, who works in social care hasn't left the house 9 months yet got offered a vaccine weeks ago.
Teachers with underlying health issues, or over 50, or… are being vaccinated
Not true. My teacher friend requires steroid inhalers and montelukast every day just to breath properly, yet doesn't qualify for the jab according to her gp.
Teachers are the one vocation (after health and care workers) I absolutely think should get it..It's absolutely ridiculous they aren't being offered a jab.
I think the decision is wrong, but I think it’s just wrong, not an evil masterplan. I’m not even of the opinion it’s being done because they can’t backtrack on the schools are safe line. I just think they believe there is greater need elsewhere for now. Again, I think they’re wrong and ALL teachers should be on the priority list
But I also think that blanket statements like ‘teachers are being denied vaccinations’ or ‘not vaccinating teachers is a political decision’ plays into the hands of conspiracists
Note the key word. I THINK….. you are free to tell me that you think different or why my thinking is wrong, but not to just dismiss it like this place tends to dismiss any alternative thought.
I think you are right.
I also think sometimes it's best just to step away. A wise man pointed me that way once.
I also think sometimes it’s best just to step away. A wise man pointed me that way once.
Those that can, do. Those that can't, teach.
Sorry, that’s what I meant.
Everybody knows that.
There is no one that thinks that no teachers at all are being vaccinated. There are many people that think that teachers and other public facing staff should take priority over workers of the same age who can work without contact with many people. Jon is just very excitable about his straw man proposition.
forget it. Can't be arsed.
How about we vaccinate teachers other than the private school ones, since they're scum?
And supermarket folks other than the Waitrose ones....?
Seems that some parts of country are further down the list than others.
I'm in West Yorks, my 50 year old other half (just happens to be a primary teacher), and two of my colleagues both with asthma (one mid 40s the other only early twenties) were vaccinated today.
Good article here about vaccines & vaccine inequality
https://www.vox.com/22285256/covid-19-vaccine-predictions
AZs uptake hesitancy stems as much from the early problems with their trials as anything
Though Tbf everyone was in a rush at the time & sanofi/GSK trial was messed up worse
& macron was obviously being a dick
Also touches on variants which are a worry, a large chuck of the world went be vaccinated for a year or more, Eastern Europe is seeing a big wave, a pool for new mutations to arise and then what happens here now that virus is under selection pressure from the vaccine?
What happens with the flu next season after we've surpressed it this year with masks & distancing?
Likewise my youngest kids haven't had chicken pox or measeles yet, nor the regular series of colds & tummy bugs their older brothers got in the first year of school?
God I'm a misery guts
I work at Waitrose! Should I feel better about my position than the plebs at Tesco etc? 😂
In all seriousness, I currently work weekends at Waitrose, and in a couple of weeks will be returning to school to teach guitar face to face, rather than online. I'm only 34, but do feel fairly pissed off that middle aged poshos earning 5 times per year what I do, working at home, will get vaccinated before I do.
Ah well. Hopefully I'll be able to get back playing gigs at some point soon, at which point I wont really care one way or the other.
What happens with the flu next season after we’ve surpressed it this year with masks & distancing?
Likewise my youngest kids haven’t had chicken pox or measeles yet, nor the regular series of colds & tummy bugs their older brothers got in the first year of school?
Surely they've been vaccinated for Measles? As for Flu deaths a large number will have died from Covid this year instead. I suspect wide scale mask usage will continue as there seems to be very little suggestion of lifting the legal compulsion anytime soon and people seem to have got used to it.
Tom B:
I understand that but the vaccines are being given to those who it is felt are most at risk from the virus rather than most at risk of catching it.
It's a risk assessment thing, we do it at work all the time. Likelihood of happening x how bad is the impact if it does. L x I
In this case it's felt that increased likelihood that you as a 34 year old will get it is outweighed by the fact it probably won't be that serious if you do.
vs
relatively unlikely to get it but bad consequences if you do.
I fully understand and agree that there should be exceptions - my wife works in a school herself, my daughter does two evenings a week on tills in the supermarket. But I can't completely argue with the general philosophy of those with the highest overall risk L x I get first dibs.
(I know it's not just the impact, but also the spreading risk - increases L for others that they live with but because the at risk are being vaccinated quickly, it's lowering I)
It's not black and white and while I think I understand why this approach, I can understand but still disagree.
Surely they’ve been vaccinated for Measles
Ah yes they have, my eldest caught it at nursery when he was younger
Yeah I totally get that @theotherjonv ....not read the last few pages, I guess that it kicked off again?!
Just to add a tiny anecdote (obviously a statistical outlier) my store was forced to close in January due to a Covid outbreak. Over 30% of staff tested positive. The person hit hardest was a late 20's guy. He ended up in hospital. He did his first shift back last Saturday and by the end of it was a literal example of the phrase'white as a ghost'.....really sobering, I've not known him long but I think he's a mtber. Top bloke from what I can tell.
Middle aged poshos....Hmmmm
No, not really - I think ambiguous language is being used in one area and someone else seems to have taken exception. It's an emotive topic, people get emotional. Daft really, over a small point.
Sadly - your workmate is the outlier, the 0.1% or whatever the number is for a typical late 20's person. Terrible phrase but 'collateral damage' and I don't mean that in any way lightly. The stats are massively in his favour but someone has to be that 0.1%. Policy needs to cover the majority number, if it can't cover everyone.
middle aged poshos
You realise you don't need to be posh to have a decent job yeah?
But console yourself with the fact that the ONS recently released stats on occupations most likely to be infected by covid. Shop workers were pretty far down the list.
If i were a betting man, i'd lay down some considerable on two things that will also become endemic -
Many will continue to wear masks
Many will insist on some distance
-
and this will become part of our fabled 'new normal'. And it will be by choice.
And then seasonal Influenza hospitalizations will decrease massively, and we'll wonder why we didn't do something so obviously easy sooner.
My friends missus is a teacher in Keighley and through her school has been contacted by a GP practice in Bradford who are fitting the teachers in before they go back in any available spaces.
Same for my wife as a police officer. Another hub is fitting them in to fill up spaces. This is only happening because one of her collegues took it upon herself to sort it out as the office has lots of retired officers working in it, so a has a much older demographic.
I'm grateful MrsMC (approaching 50 but in denial) got her first jab 3 weeks ago, as a frontline social worker. Their risk level was relatively high on the much criticised BBC Reality Check report, but she's been in and out of client's houses throughout the pandemic with just a mask and hand sanitiser, and quite a lot of clientville are a bit lax with the guidelines.
I know a lot of less deserving council staff also got the jab at the same time. No doubt a lot of deserving ones missed out.
Good balanced video (without his normal jokes) from Dr Rohin Francis about COVID and schools. The description below the video links to the papers he refers to.
Posi covid news! Covid cases falling globally. im hyped had 2 coffees and its sunny! https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/coronavirus-cases-falling-globally-big-question/
Good video that. It challenges some of the thinking of the actual risk faced by teachers (and I STILL think they should be prioritised anyway) so may not be popular. Also alludes (well TBF mentions that he isn't going to go there) that there are some that 'believe' that the refusal to mass vaccinate all teachers is some sort of conspiracy. But I'd better not go there because I get over excitable.
Thanks theotherjonv - at the end Rohin says he's also in favour of vaccination of teachers
But console yourself with the fact that the ONS recently released stats on occupations most likely to be infected by covid. Shop workers were pretty far down the list.
As are teachers...
That's not the same info as was released 4 days ago..teachers are 4th.
Either way, shop workers don't appear on either list.
That’s not the same info as was released 4 days ago..teachers are 4th.
That ONS data groups teachers and university teaching staff together... despite the fact that uni staff have in the main not been with their students or each other over the period covered (this academic year) so will be pulling the average down.
Secondary school and sixth form teachers should have been vaccinated before their schools are filled up again. Primary school teachers should also be a priority, once all the over 60s and at risk categories have been covered. As should the police, prison guards etc who don't have control over who they have to deal with at close contact indoors.
The ONS data must have some baseline for what is actually open. I don't believe that on Monday 8 March the manager of a (Closed) restaurant will be at greater risk than a teacher (in an Open school).
The actions that we take as a society actively change the relative risk for everyone.
Restaurants were open for the first few months of the ONS period, and I can absolutely believe that during that time the people working in them were much more at risk of being part of the chain of transmission than just about anyone else. Keeping them closed for now is a depressing necessity. But, again, as the government is prioritising what we reopen, and who should be back in public facing roles first... that should feed into which working age people are vaccinated first (behind the elderly and those otherwise identified as most likely to be hospitalised and/or die).
JCVI sticking with age based system for second phase, simplicity trumps all else.
Yes, it's simple. Vaccinating an IT professional with the option to work from home, rather than a secondary school teacher told to be in front of multiple groups of older teens indoors in winter, is most definitely "simple".
What did I just read?
Yes, it’s simple. Vaccinating an IT professional with the option to work from home, rather than a secondary school teacher told to be in front of multiple groups of older teens indoors in winter, is most definitely “simple”.
I don't disagree that teachers should be prioritised but it isn't simple. You're oversimplifying
"Vaccinating an IT professional who has the option to work from home but if they were to get infected have a significant likelihood of a serious outcome due to their age / underlying issues....
vs
"a secondary school teacher told to be in front of multiple groups of older teens....... but who if infected is highly unlikely to have a serious outcome
whoops, double post
Thing is, if we're vaccinating on health grounds, (age and vulnerability) then the folk who're mostly doing the work, the GP get to pick those people from our current records...If you start to do it on some thing like vocation (comparative exposure)...You'll have to have people to prove to you what they do. The current system needs no further evidence. You get a text, you show up...
I don't think it should be up to GPs and health workers to be the arbiters of who's telling porkies to get an early vaccine.
Just seen the announcement..
I imagine alot of angry folks at moment..
It would be nice to pick out groups of people who should get the vaccine before others but I struggle to criticise much about the process. We are all so lucky that there is a vaccine and we are unbelievably luck that it is coming to us all so quickly. The vast majority of people at serious risk will have had some degree of vaccination by the end of March, I struggle to have words for how amazing that is.
stcolin :What did I just read?
So a geophysical event caused by the sun is affecting iron levels in our blood leading to cellular changes within our bodies, something.....something iron and lightning as well as the mineral content of areas of the earth leading to peaks of cellular disruption in march and October is to blame.
Seems legit...... Im away to buy directional and cryogenically treated oxygen free copper speaker cables to insert up my arse and leave trailing on the ground behind me, sorta like those earthing straps you found on shoddy vauxhall viva's back in the late 70's.
I await my Nobel prize for services to humanity.
I imagine alot of angry folks at moment..
Most folk I speak with about when they're getting a vaccine understand the underlying principles...And they want their granny and grandads to get it first. I've spoken with all sorts of folk, and none of them are angry. rather as jp-t853 points out, are just grateful there's a vaccine and in due course they'll get it.
I don’t think it should be up to GPs and health workers to be the arbiters of who’s telling porkies to get an early vaccine.
Agreed. But as I said on the other page, it doesn't have to be you. Vaccinating workers at institutions (be it schools, prisons, carehomes or whatever) doesn't have to be done by GPs. Proving who works at those institutions is trivial when you involve their employers.
Who would have thought this time last year that we would be getting angry about getting a vaccine.
The sun is out, spring is in the air.
Thing is, if we’re vaccinating on health grounds, (age and vulnerability) then the folk who’re mostly doing the work, the GP get to pick those people from our current records…If you start to do it on some thing like vocation (comparative exposure)…You’ll have to have people to prove to you what they do. The current system needs no further evidence. You get a text, you show up…
cant disagree with this, just filling out "profession" when getting car insurance is complicated enough. I can imagine the complexities of doing so for everyone, immediately.
It seems (correct me if I'm wrong) that we are in an enviable position of having enough vaccines and the limiting factor at the moment is the staffing and administration of actually getting it into people?
And they want their granny and grandads to get it first.
Everyone does. And that's been happening. In all the areas I know about it's done. Under 60s coming on board now... targeting the at risk of hospitalisation and/or death has been done, or is close to being done. Now it's the rest of us, the priorities in "unlocking" and in vaccination role out can inform each other, and should. Those shouting "simplify" are suggesting that joined up government, policy and implementation is too much to ask for.
On the subject of teaching - I gave a talk yesterday to 600 people at work on "covid19 - one year on". Summarized some of the key developments, a lot of which I have posted here. It was recorded, is non confidential and does not represent GSK policy or opinion. I'm looking to see if I can post it somewhere (hosting advice please - YouTube?). Otherwise, I'll record it again - more advice please - I may be a geek but there is a limit to my geekiness 😉
And vaccinate those with most contacts prior to them resuming contacts would be a reasonable rule. But longer-term vaccination will be routine.
In all the areas I know about it’s done
kinda..first part of a two part process has been largely done
True.
TiRed ... upload to a free Vimeo account, if you just want to be able to share/embed it, rather than get pulled into the YouTube social stuff.