The vaccine

[Bouleversee]

If you say so. I've only heard of the one.

[swill453]

My wife's sister, who is 74 and lives in Eastbourne, has been offered a vaccination next Thursday. She has no underlying conditions or reason to get it before others her age. They must be rattling through the priority lists - I thought Eastbourne had one of the highest proportions of oldies.

Scott.

[Lootman]

My wife's sister, who is 74 and lives in Eastbourne, has been offered a vaccination next Thursday. She has no underlying conditions or reason to get it before others her age. They must be rattling through the priority lists - I thought Eastbourne had one of the highest proportions of oldies.

Two theories:

Eastbourne gets more vaccine because of the number of seniors there. Or

Those who are nearly 75 get included with the over-75's in order to ensure nobody is missed out because of switching between priority groups in the next few weeks.

Of course both of those assume some intelligence in those organising this.

[tjh290633]

Well, the group of 5 practices that are doing our vaccinations have just had their first delivery, done some care homes today, and have a full schedule for Saturday and Sunday. They reckon it will take 4 or 5 deliveries to cater for all the over-80s, and they don't yet know when to expect the next delivery, so cannot send out invitations until they do.

TJH

[sg31]

Apparently the Brazilian variant is already in the UK, according to Medical News Today:

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articl ... e74a4f1c#2

Ah but it is not THE Brazilian variant but another one.

John

It's only in a narrow strip down the middle apparently.

(sorry, I couldn't resist)

[staffordian]

Well, the group of 5 practices that are doing our vaccinations have just had their first delivery, done some care homes today, and have a full schedule for Saturday and Sunday. They reckon it will take 4 or 5 deliveries to cater for all the over-80s, and they don't yet know when to expect the next delivery, so cannot send out invitations until they do.

TJH

Our practice have just announced on Facebook that they should complete the 80+ patients this weekend and will be starting on the 75 to 79 group on Monday. Some apointments for this group have already been made.

They have joined forces with at least one other practice and are working in a local church hall.

Seems well organised so far, except for several comments on Facebook claiming some over 80s have not yet been contacted. Maybe they don't have phones, and their letters are in the post?

I know one 78 year old who had a text on Tuesday asking them to contact the surgery for an appointment so text is obviously their preferred MO.

[tjh290633]

Seems well organised so far, except for several comments on Facebook claiming some over 80s have not yet been contacted. Maybe they don't have phones, and their letters are in the post?

I know one 78 year old who had a text on Tuesday asking them to contact the surgery for an appointment so text is obviously their preferred MO.

I had a text at lunchtime, giving me the website link to book an appointment tomorrow. The times available were from 19:10 onwards. My wife, who does not have a mobile phone is not included. I have taken the first available slot.

TJH

[XFool]

I know one 78 year old who had a text on Tuesday asking them to contact the surgery for an appointment so text is obviously their preferred MO.

Throughout the pandemic so far I have been kept updated by texts from the "NHS". Some likely are from GP's surgery.

[Bouleversee]

Some expert on Today this morning said THE Brazilian variant had not yet arrived in this country.

[funduffer]

Seems well organised so far, except for several comments on Facebook claiming some over 80s have not yet been contacted. Maybe they don't have phones, and their letters are in the post?

I know one 78 year old who had a text on Tuesday asking them to contact the surgery for an appointment so text is obviously their preferred MO.

I had a text at lunchtime, giving me the website link to book an appointment tomorrow. The times available were from 19:10 onwards. My wife, who does not have a mobile phone is not included. I have taken the first available slot.

TJH

I am pleased to hear that, Terry. At one stage you seemed reluctant to take the vaccine, so I am glad you have reconsidered. We would hate for such a distinguished LF contributor to fall sick,

FD

[tjh290633]

I had a text at lunchtime, giving me the website link to book an appointment tomorrow. The times available were from 19:10 onwards. My wife, who does not have a mobile phone is not included. I have taken the first available slot.

TJH

I am pleased to hear that, Terry. At one stage you seemed reluctant to take the vaccine, so I am glad you have reconsidered. We would hate for such a distinguished LF contributor to fall sick,

FD

I wasn't reluctant. What I am critical of is some of the lockdown measures. More rigid policing of social distancing and mask wearing, plus compulsory hand washing, would probably have a better effect while allowing a lot more activity to continue without hindrance.

TJH

[XFool]

Now for something completely difference! But, IMO, still in the spirit of the thread.

I have seen this (US) archive photo before. Just in case you haven't! My favourite UK archive photo also involves children - that one taken outside a public school.

https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2021/01/vaccine-photography/617678/

[Itsallaguess]

Some info from the Andrew Marr show this morning -

NHS England chief executive Sir Simon Stevens is asked about the possibility of a 24/7 vaccine rollout.

He says the NHS will start testing this in some hospitals in the next 10 days.

He says at the moment the NHS is vaccinating at the rate of 140 jabs a minute.

Sir Simon says he is "pretty confident" that by Sunday night the NHS will have done "1.5 million this past week" - up from one million the previous week and a third of million the week before.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-55694385

Encouraging news...

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

[Mike4]

Ah you've found that "fish pun" website too eh?!

RThe difference here was that is wasn't a joke, but pun which reflected the character of Frinton. Ok, I know you know that, but I just thought I'd labour the point that it wasn't an isolated pun for the sake of it but had a local reality.

Arb.

All this carp is a bit off topic for vaccine talk, the least you could do is give the needlefish a mention...

Good point.

I fixed a boiler yesterday for an ICU doctor and he had an interesting thing to say about the vaccine. He said it is desperately fragile and easy to get wrong in its preparation. There are about five different things that need to be done exactly right to prepare it for injection and doing any of them wrong will make it ineffective, simply fail to work in his opinion.

Worse, he sometimes sees doses administered that he thinks have have been badly/wrongly prepared/stored and probably will not impart any degree of immunity. A future scandal in the making possibly, if this is widespread and if I understood him correctly.

Stupidly, I forgot to ask which vaccine. Pfizer I guess.

[UncleEbenezer]

Worse, he sometimes sees doses administered that he thinks have have been badly/wrongly prepared/stored and probably will not impart any degree of immunity. A future scandal in the making possibly, if this is widespread and if I understood him correctly.

Should still make a pretty good placebo.

[Arborbridge]

Worse, he sometimes sees doses administered that he thinks have have been badly/wrongly prepared/stored and probably will not impart any degree of immunity. A future scandal in the making possibly, if this is widespread and if I understood him correctly.

Should still make a pretty good placebo.

Except that to make a good palcebo there has to be a record somewhere of which were administered badly.

On the serious point, it does worry me that tens of thousands of people are apparently being roped in to do this. Is there really time to give proper training?

[dealtn]

Worse, he sometimes sees doses administered that he thinks have have been badly/wrongly prepared/stored and probably will not impart any degree of immunity. A future scandal in the making possibly, if this is widespread and if I understood him correctly.

Should still make a pretty good placebo.

Except that to make a good palcebo there has to be a record somewhere of which were administered badly.

On the serious point, it does worry me that tens of thousands of people are apparently being roped in to do this. Is there really time to give proper training?

Genuine question.

Where are you hearing of these 10s or thousands? What roles do you think they are doing, the inexperienced ones you are worried about?

My wife used to do injections in the community, mainly schoolchildren. She has undergone the "retraining" as part of her application to join the covid-vaccine teams, and as yet hasn't been appointed. I would be interested in hearing any other real world examples of people doing the injections that weren't already "vaccine trained" and what their backgrounds are.

[Arborbridge]

Should still make a pretty good placebo.

Except that to make a good palcebo there has to be a record somewhere of which were administered badly.

On the serious point, it does worry me that tens of thousands of people are apparently being roped in to do this. Is there really time to give proper training?

Genuine question.

Where are you hearing of these 10s or thousands? What roles do you think they are doing, the inexperienced ones you are worried about?

My wife used to do injections in the community, mainly schoolchildren. She has undergone the "retraining" as part of her application to join the covid-vaccine teams, and as yet hasn't been appointed. I would be interested in hearing any other real world examples of people doing the injections that weren't already "vaccine trained" and what their backgrounds are.

The government announced that they were recruiting 80,000 people to help in the program, but the devil is in the detail. I am hopeful that most of the people would be employed as helpers to organise queues, paperwork, telephone contacts, rather than actually mixing and jabbing.
We must assume that only qualified staff would do that......wouldn't they?
But as Mike wrote, we could be looking at a current cock up and future scandal. At least the fake news people will have more to write about.

Arb.

[dealtn]

Except that to make a good palcebo there has to be a record somewhere of which were administered badly.

On the serious point, it does worry me that tens of thousands of people are apparently being roped in to do this. Is there really time to give proper training?

Genuine question.

Where are you hearing of these 10s or thousands? What roles do you think they are doing, the inexperienced ones you are worried about?

My wife used to do injections in the community, mainly schoolchildren. She has undergone the "retraining" as part of her application to join the covid-vaccine teams, and as yet hasn't been appointed. I would be interested in hearing any other real world examples of people doing the injections that weren't already "vaccine trained" and what their backgrounds are.

The government announced that they were recruiting 80,000 people to help in the program, but the devil is in the detail. I am hopeful that most of the people would be employed as helpers to organise queues, paperwork, telephone contacts, rather than actually mixing and jabbing.
We must assume that only qualified staff would do that......wouldn't they?
But as Mike wrote, we could be looking at a current cock up and future scandal. At least the fake news people will have more to write about.

Arb.

I agree they should be. But you said it was something you were worried about, hence my request as to what people were being drafted in to, particularly the roles we might be worried about. The only experiences I have are of qualified people doing such roles, and as yet my wife, who is qualified, has yet to be offered such a role.

Anyone have any evidence that non-qualified people are doing this? The anecdote of the ICU doctor suggests either non-qualified, poorly trained, or just ineffective nurses, performing the role.

[staffordian]

...The anecdote of the ICU doctor suggests either non-qualified, poorly trained, or just ineffective nurses, performing the role.

Or perhaps bad handling before it actually gets to the professionals doing the jabbing?