Coronavirus

geo4chg said:

Yeah I agree, the 60% figure makes it sound like vaccines aren’t working when they are. What you’ve got to think is that majority unvaccinated are younger who are far less likely to be hospitalised. Put it this way, if all of the population was vaccinated that % would be 100% but likely be a lower figure in raw numbers than even now.

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Not only this but the number of people who have been vaccinated far out number the ones who havent.

Delta associated deaths:

92 deaths from the unvaccinated

118 from double vaccinated.

So 92 deaths from a much much smaller pool of people is still far far worse isn't it?

Vaccines work.

I’m really conflicted on unlocking if I’m honest, on the one hand we have to do it at some point unless we are condemning ourselves to perpetual restrictions, and summer season during school holidays is a good time to do it.

On the other hand our case rate is incredibly high, now there is a chance that could perversely play to our advantage as a big spread through an already largely partially immune population may kick the virus into the endemic phase quicker, alternatively it will breed a variant with far greater vaccine escape.

As far as hospitals go we will cope, but it will be at the cost of routine care.

Rick said:

@Craig I agree with everything you have said, but a number of things that you have asserted are not the common understanding or indeed commonly accepted amongst the public (despite being correct). People have been hanging on the fact that the vaccination programme was our route to freedom (day) and I am not sure that there is a realisation about how things could now go despite the efficacy of the vaccine and despite the success of the rollout programme. We've seen evidence of that on this forum.

Cases are going to grow exponentially and the trajectory is largely going to be influenced by the behaviour of us as a society. Look at Israel ... they're four weeks ahead of us in terms of unlock and are already evaluating whether to reimpose some restrictions to protect their healthcare system.

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I agree, the whole thing could've been explained much better and far more clearly than it was. And just to further complicate matters, the statistic he gave was the wrong way round...

imanautie said:

The wording of the BBC news article about the night club rules ( https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-57893788 ) would appear to be more generic then night clubs and potentially cover theme parks.

mainly this bit..
"nightclubs and other venues where large crowds gather in England will need to be fully vaccinated from the end of September"

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Ahh it's amazing we're so far into this and still having potential new laws being announced without any sort of substantial information on the specifics, just a generic headline covering one sector and allowing the news sites to speculate on the rest.

My gut feeling is that the government have seen how much the French passport scheme has encouraged take up of the vaccine and thought they'd give it a shot themselves. The backbenchers will no doubt kick off, the government meanwhile hope cases will go down as a result and the actual law won't need to be introduced. They succeed in encouraging vaccine take-up, and keep the backbenchers happy by not imposing a vaccine passport.

geo4chg said:

Yeah I agree, the 60% figure makes it sound like vaccines aren’t working when they are. What you’ve got to think is that majority unvaccinated are younger who are far less likely to be hospitalised. Put it this way, if all of the population was vaccinated that % would be 100% but likely be a lower figure in raw numbers than even now.

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The Guardian had an interesting article on this. Basically a vaccinated 80 year old carries approximately the same risk of death as an unvaccinated 50 year old, i.e. much lower but not zero.

It looks like there is valid concern that first doses seem to have settled at just below 88% of the adult popultion. Relatively small numbers of first doses are now being given each day, and 12% of the adult popultion not having the vaccine is significant. I know vaccine passports are somewhat controversial and I am not sure that the threat of them is the best way to go about increasing vaccine uptake. Having said that vaccine bookings rocketed in France following their health pass annoucement.

I don't have too much of a problem with those who choose not to have the vaccine having more inconveniences in their lives. So long as there is an easy way for those who can't have the vaccine for genuine medial reasons to not suffer at all. It is pretty clear that vaccines are going to be essential for any form of foreign travel for the foreseeable future.

As for yesterday's unlocking, my thoughts pretty much echo Dave's above. I can see both sides to the argument; if you don't do it now then when would you ever, but equally we are taking huge risks and I would it would not be a surprise if a new more concerning variant appeared in the UK over the next month or so.

Alsty said:

The Guardian had an interesting article on this. Basically a vaccinated 80 year old carries approximately the same risk of death as an unvaccinated 50 year old, i.e. much lower but not zero.

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Yeah the vaccines seem to reduce the risk profile by about 20-30 years. So as you say a 80 year old has the risk of an unvaccinated 50 year old, and a 50 year old somewhere in the 20’s.

The vaccinations are working very well and hopefully will drive the pandemic into an endemic, variants aside which are a worry the next big issue is going to be all the other winter virus’s that we have now got depleted immunity to. When winter hits that’s going to be a problem.

Rob said:

I don't have too much of a problem with those who choose not to have the vaccine having more inconveniences in their lives. So long as there is an easy way for those who can't have the vaccine for genuine medial reasons to not suffer at all. It is pretty clear that vaccines are going to be essential for any form of foreign travel for the foreseeable future.

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That depends, is it nightclubs and similar places only or 'crowded spaces'? If it's the latter then we will need to start showing vaccine passports on the tube, in supermarkets, shopping centres, among many other settings. Having to do this when out purchasing basic necessities is totally different than requiring proof of vaccination to go abroad (the latter I have no issue with).

Ultimately I do think, as we've already had a huge backlash before with this, domestic vaccine passports are being used as a threat to coerce people into the vaccine and it won't happen. Surely there's even less justification for a domestic vaccine passport when we know you can still catch COVID despite being fully vaccinated?

Depends on your definition of "crowded space". I can see it for nightclubs, music festivals, maybe football stadiums, concerts and the like. I don't see it for shops as they're frankly not that crowded compared to the above examples. The tube gets busy but I don't see it happening as there's just so many points you can enter the network that it couldn't possibly be enforced.

Danza91 said:

Surely there's even less justification for a domestic vaccine passport when we know you can still catch COVID despite being fully vaccinated?

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"Still catch" doesn't mean equivalence to an unvaccinated person. I don't know exactly what effect the vaccine has on transmissibility but since it reduces it then it's a no-brainer to encourage (or require it) for crowded settings. It means you can have more people in the venue and be a similar risk to a smaller crowd of unvaccinated people.

I don't go to nightclubs anyway, but there is no chance in hell that I would be going to a nightclub at the moment. I do go to football matches, and by the time the season starts I will be classed as fully vaccinated. I am not going to any of our pre-season friendlies as I usually would as I am not fully vaccinated and there are seemingly no mitigating measures at these games.

I personally would feel much more comfortable going to football mathes in full stadiums if I knew everyone was vaccinated. I know it does not eradicate the risk, but it does help to reduce the risk which is key.

Most things in life have their pros and cons and I'm sure the Covid passport argument has its nuances. However, when I hear people 'arguing' against them, it normally involves ludicrous comparisons to the Nazis, rather than any 'actual' arguments. I also don't tend to hear people putting forward any real alternatives. If we still had the original variant of the virus, we'd probably have reached herd immunity by now, and we wouldn't be talking about vaccine passports. Vaccine passports clearly wasn't a route the government wanted to go down, but given how contageous the new variants are, what is the alternative? Aside from letting the bodies piles up.

That's the point I'm making, a crowded space, what exactly does that mean? Where do you draw the line? It becomes messy, confusing and unenforceable, particularly with hospitality. Shops most definitely get crowded, anyone ever been to Oxford Street or Cheshire Oaks on a weekend?

As I said before, I just can't see this being enforced, or, like Test & Trace, it'll be ignored by many businesses.

On a separate note, yesterday's briefing contained probably the biggest load of word salad this whole pandemic.

Danza91 said:

That's the point I'm making, a crowded space, what exactly does that mean? Where do you draw the line?

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Generally I expect it would only apply to indoor spaces. Oxford Street and Cheshre Oaks are outdoors where you are generally constantly moving rather than being in an indoor space with the same people constantly.

Danza91 said:

That's the point I'm making, a crowded space, what exactly does that mean? Where do you draw the line?

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The example they gave was nightclubs, so I would think it would only apply to proper mass gatherings that are similar in scope and scale - so off the top of my head festivals, gigs, comedy clubs, indoor arenas (velodromes, boxing arenas and the like), perhaps theatres at a push - they will generally be ticketed or admission based indoor places. I don't for one second think they mean shopping centres or individual shops, pubs etc, but I suppose we will have to wait and see.

Here's what Boris Johnson said about compulsory ID cards in 2004:

"A recipe for tyranny and oppression...and that’s why I oppose the scheme. If I’m obliged to have one by the emanations of the state, I will grind it and eat it on my cornflakes.”

Lol happy eating!!


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monkeyboy said:

Here's what Boris Johnson said about compulsory ID cards in 2004:

"A recipe for tyranny and oppression...and that’s why I oppose the scheme. If I’m obliged to have one by the emanations of the state, I will grind it and eat it on my cornflakes.”

Lol happy eating!!


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Ah yes, back in 2004, when we didn’t have a GLOBAL PANDEMIC to deal with


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I just worry that it will become more than showing your covid status.

Showing you driving license to prove you age versus a company scanning the NHS app which holds a little more data than covid status is worth a discussion.

Didn’t the nhs back track on the app recently on making it difficult to opt out of what data was stored like sexual orientation, criminal record and trade union membership to name a few?

To me it seems a very good starting point for an ID card but only time will tell. Let’s hope it won’t get to that point by September


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monkeyboy said:

To me it seems a very good starting point for an ID card but only time will tell. Let’s hope it won’t get to that point by September

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I'm all for ID cards, a single integrated card (managed electronically even better) that holds passport, driving license, NHS, criminal record, COVID status etc all in one place would be a lot easier than the current half dozen items we have now. But then I'm not one of those people that buys into the whole "iPhones listen to you" debate so can see how others that think differently might object.

Personally, I find the idea that someone may potentially be banned from living a normal life over their wish to control what goes into their body a tad bit insane.

Let's not forget that these vaccines are only authorised for emergency use ( the Vulnerable/elderly ) so it's baffling that millions of young and healthy people are being coerced and blackmailed in to getting it.

I'm not saying that the vaccine doesn't work but I'm also aware that reports of injuries and deaths post vaccination are increasing worldwide by the day and if you look hard enough, there are medical experts voicing their concerns about their effectiveness.

I'm sure that this post will go down like a lead balloon and I don't mean to cause offence. I'm also well aware that I'm no Vaccine or medical expect but Boris's announcement yesterday on ''freedom day'' has made my blood boil. The whole concept of a Vaccine Passport is discriminatory, unethical and unlawful. It's also something that Mr.Zahawi and this hopeless Government have previously said would never come in to fruition and this may well still be case but all of the lies, scaremongering and coercion stinks.

I think one of the main arguments against the Vaccine Passports that Boris spoke of yesterday is the fact that negative test results may no longer hold any value yet someone who can prove they are double jabbed but may actually have the virus will seemingly be able to do as they please.

SirDossa said:

Let's not forget that these vaccines are only authorised for emergency use

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I don't think thats quite true. They were approved under a Conditional Marketing Authorisation (CMA).

"CMAs are intended for medicinal products that address an unmet medical need, such as a lack of alternative therapy for a serious and life-threatening disease. CMAs may be granted where comprehensive clinical data are not yet complete, but it is judged that such data will become available soon."
From (regarding the AstraZenica)
Summary of the Public Assessment Report (PAR) for Vaxzevria - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

I think for Pfizer it was more of an emergency approval.
But since then it has been confirmed they are safe for continued use.
Latest monitoring data confirms safety of COVID-19 vaccines - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

monkeyboy said:

I just worry that it will become more than showing your covid status.

Showing you driving license to prove you age versus a company scanning the NHS app which holds a little more data than covid status is worth a discussion.

Didn’t the nhs back track on the app recently on making it difficult to opt out of what data was stored like sexual orientation, criminal record and trade union membership to name a few?

To me it seems a very good starting point for an ID card but only time will tell. Let’s hope it won’t get to that point by September


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You're going to be livid when you find out how they want to tackle voter fraud.

Hint, it's required ID when voting.