So you think it's fine for them to lie about the success of their scheme? I call our government out all the time, multiple times today in fact. The EU is having a worse crisis than the UK government and they're using a similar "world beating" narrative that has been criticised here so much. It deserves nothing but contempt just as the government bullshit over here does.
More or less agreed.
Though I give them (and any government) a little leeway in bigging up good news on vaccines. They are, after all, our only way out, and encouraging people to get vaccinated is a good thing.
So you think it's fine for them to lie about the success of their scheme? I call our government out all the time, multiple times today in fact. The EU is having a worse crisis than the UK government and they're using a similar "world beating" narrative that has been criticised here so much. It deserves nothing but contempt just as the government bullshit over here does.
I literally couldn't care less what some bloke in the EU is saying.
Why? Because it has zero impact on the lives of anyone in this country.
Europe fucking up the vaccine roll out has a huge impact on us. It's no use for the UK to bounce back by April next year of the European economy is still in turmoil locking down to avoid this new COVID.
Boris and Shapps are actually coming across rather well and professionally in this press conference (I've only just logged on so I haven't been influenced by the chat on this thread).
It feels to me like Allegra and Carrie have been doing some training.
Consumate professionals. Like Laurel and Hardy or Morecambe and Wise?
Shaps is actually a pretty good communicator. He's been a bit of a surprise of the covid crisis. The other bloke is woeful. As ever.
So you think it's fine for them to lie about the success of their scheme? I call our government out all the time, multiple times today in fact. The EU is having a worse crisis than the UK government and they're using a similar "world beating" narrative that has been criticised here so much. It deserves nothing but contempt just as the government bullshit over here does.
I literally couldn't care less what some bloke in the EU is saying.
Why? Because it has zero impact on the lives of anyone in this country.
Europe fucking up the vaccine roll out has a huge impact on us. It's no use for the UK to bounce back by April next year of the European economy is still in turmoil locking down to avoid this new COVID.
It's alright though because we can just import our super COVID from the rest of the world. Europe is the past remember.
Boris and Shapps are actually coming across rather well and professionally in this press conference (I've only just logged on so I haven't been influenced by the chat on this thread).
It feels to me like Allegra and Carrie have been doing some training.
Consumate professionals. Like Laurel and Hardy or Morecambe and Wise?
Shaps is actually a pretty good communicator. He's been a bit of a surprise of the covid crisis. ...
He is. Shame he doesn't have the judgment to match.
Boris and Shapps are actually coming across rather well and professionally in this press conference (I've only just logged on so I haven't been influenced by the chat on this thread).
It feels to me like Allegra and Carrie have been doing some training.
Consumate professionals. Like Laurel and Hardy or Morecambe and Wise?
Have you watched it? Or did you decide beforehand?
We need to build a wall and make Londoners and the South pay for it.
Looking at this, and Malmesbury’s excellent data, it is striking how R0 does NOT correlate with relative poverty. The richest parts of England are the most infected, some of the poorest parts of the UK have some of the lowest covid rates in the country.
Really? I was some years back on a holiday in Kent - inter aliis looked at a NT cottage in the Werald, stayed overnight in Maidstone and drove to Chatham for the nautical archaeology and Rochester Castle. I was struck by the disparities in wealth and income as we went throiugh it - Jessica's Pony's field alternating with grim proletarian pockets.
The UK is somewhat unusual in not hard-zoning it's poverty. The proles are showed out of the nice old stone parts of the villages, into the super grim council estate around the corner.
Compare with France, where the districts are close to being a different country. Even outside the big cities, the poverty seems to be segregated and carefully tucked away.
I believe this is a good thing. Don’t you?
In Britain we are all mixed up. Council estates right by million pound mansions. We share the country. We walk the same pavements and play in the same parks.
France is insane, the way it carefully sequesters the poor.
Everyone knows this happens in Paris - the suburbs are the places of banishment - but it happens everywhere. Lyon is a great example. I went there 2 years ago and thought wow, what a beautiful rich old city, France is so lucky, everyone is middle class and all the women have Hermes scarves.
Total crap of course. The other day I met a young woman who taught in Lyon. She commuted OUT from the bourgeois city centre to the multi cultural distant suburbs, she told me the poverty is dire.
But tourists never see it. Because it is banished from sight. See Roger’s comment earlier today about Paris being a ‘beautiful small walkable capital city’. He is just oblivious to the 80% of Paris outside le peripherique
So you think it's fine for them to lie about the success of their scheme? I call our government out all the time, multiple times today in fact. The EU is having a worse crisis than the UK government and they're using a similar "world beating" narrative that has been criticised here so much. It deserves nothing but contempt just as the government bullshit over here does.
More or less agreed.
Though I give them (and any government) a little leeway in bigging up good news on vaccines. They are, after all, our only way out, and encouraging people to get vaccinated is a good thing.
The thing is the issue isn't even the late approval, it's the lack of actual bloody deliveries. The EU is going to collectively get fewer actual vaccines than the UK in the first quarter of 2022. Their scheme prioritised price over speed and now they're hoping that CureVac not only passes muster but can rapidly scale up manufacturing in the first half of the year, but realistically it will be October before there are significant deliveries of the CureVac vaccine.
A little bit of humility would go a long way. I say the same for Boris who should admit that the government has got it wrong on test/track/trace/isolation and keeping the border open all this time. That he won't is why I'll never vote for him or the Tories while he is still leader.
I would ask the question to lockdown deniers what body count they are willing to countenance to keep things "normal" beyond which they would support restrictions but then remember they don't believe anyone is dying of Covid so the question is moot.
Given that we're doing more COVID genomic mapping than anyone and over 40% of whats being done on the entire planet, you'd think the EU might want to stay in touch...
Does that mean that we get out flights back? Although in a case I am involved in its been confirmed that there are currently no cases of the new variant recorded in Lothian.
So you think it's fine for them to lie about the success of their scheme? I call our government out all the time, multiple times today in fact. The EU is having a worse crisis than the UK government and they're using a similar "world beating" narrative that has been criticised here so much. It deserves nothing but contempt just as the government bullshit over here does.
More or less agreed.
Though I give them (and any government) a little leeway in bigging up good news on vaccines. They are, after all, our only way out, and encouraging people to get vaccinated is a good thing.
The thing is the issue isn't even the late approval, it's the lack of actual bloody deliveries. The EU is going to collectively get fewer actual vaccines than the UK in the first quarter of 2022. Their scheme prioritised price over speed and now they're hoping that CureVac not only passes muster but can rapidly scale up manufacturing in the first half of the year, but realistically it will be October before there are significant deliveries of the CureVac vaccine.
A little bit of humility would go a long way. I say the same for Boris who should admit that the government has got it wrong on test/track/trace/isolation and keeping the border open all this time. That he won't is why I'll never vote for him or the Tories while he is still leader.
I am just hoping the AZN vaccine rapidly gets approved, and we can donate some of our spare stock to the continent. The setback to the Sanofi/GSK effort was most disappointing.
People often assume he doesn't bother, not realising that he carefully makes sure it looks messed up (and, nowadays, carefully pulls some of it over the top) before going on stage.
It's worth remembering when we constantly criticize our own governments that other countries, even those we hold up in high regard, often have the same sorts of domestic discussions about (in)competence as we do.
A damning article, indeed, particularly vis-a-vis the EC.
People often assume he doesn't bother, not realising that he carefully makes sure it looks messed up (and, nowadays, carefully pulls some of it over the top) before going on stage.
Yes, he is clearly suffering hair loss
Embrace your baldness Boris - go for the number one all over like the rest of us slap heads!!
Portsmouth in tier 4, Fareham in tier 2? Tier 2!!! Huh?
I've got rellies in SE Hampshire, who have two theories. One is that Fareham Borough has a big rural hinterland bringing the overall average down, even if it would be logical to include Fareham Town in the Plague Zone. The other dark mutterings are that the AG is MP for Fareham, which outranks being Fred Dinenage's daughter, junior health minister and MP for Gosport.
Boris and Shapps are actually coming across rather well and professionally in this press conference (I've only just logged on so I haven't been influenced by the chat on this thread).
It feels to me like Allegra and Carrie have been doing some training.
Consumate professionals. Like Laurel and Hardy or Morecambe and Wise?
Have you watched it? Or did you decide beforehand?
Did you not read my insightful comments on Johnson's hair?
Anecdote: my uncle's care home in Penzance has now had the vaccination done (obvs part 1). I'm quite impressed how the thing is rolling out across the country - I don't really care if people according to preference want to credit Boris or the centralised NHS or the brilliance of Britain, I'm just really pleased to see something working well.
Nick, my mum`s care home in Devon still has heard nothing (as far as I know). So a postcode lottery of some sort is happening I think. Inevitable to some extent TBF.
Did your uncle`s care home receive a visit from medics to administer the jabs to all the residents in one go, or were the residents transported somewhere? Did they have to get consent from each resident (or relative with a POA)?
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
People often assume he doesn't bother, not realising that he carefully makes sure it looks messed up (and, nowadays, carefully pulls some of it over the top) before going on stage.
Yes, he is clearly suffering hair loss
Embrace your baldness Boris - go for the number one all over like the rest of us slap heads!!
Not sure he has the head shape to pull that look off. Someone showed a photo of him in a beanie that covered his hair completely and he was unrecognizable as well.
It's worth remembering when we constantly criticize our own governments that other countries, even those we hold up in high regard, often have the same sorts of domestic discussions about (in)competence as we do.
A damning article, indeed, particularly vis-a-vis the EC.
The behaviour of the French government in this regard... Yes, I know this is how it rolls there. But as someone who has French family etc - could they stop just for once?
So you think it's fine for them to lie about the success of their scheme? I call our government out all the time, multiple times today in fact. The EU is having a worse crisis than the UK government and they're using a similar "world beating" narrative that has been criticised here so much. It deserves nothing but contempt just as the government bullshit over here does.
More or less agreed.
Though I give them (and any government) a little leeway in bigging up good news on vaccines. They are, after all, our only way out, and encouraging people to get vaccinated is a good thing.
The thing is the issue isn't even the late approval, it's the lack of actual bloody deliveries. The EU is going to collectively get fewer actual vaccines than the UK in the first quarter of 2022. Their scheme prioritised price over speed and now they're hoping that CureVac not only passes muster but can rapidly scale up manufacturing in the first half of the year, but realistically it will be October before there are significant deliveries of the CureVac vaccine.
A little bit of humility would go a long way. I say the same for Boris who should admit that the government has got it wrong on test/track/trace/isolation and keeping the border open all this time. That he won't is why I'll never vote for him or the Tories while he is still leader.
I am just hoping the AZN vaccine rapidly gets approved, and we can donate some of our spare stock to the continent. The setback to the Sanofi/GSK effort was most disappointing.
Yes, I hope it does too. Surely if we have leftovers some will be reserved just in case we need boosters later in the year and in the queue of who gets spare doses Europe is probably not very high on the list, I'd imagine developing nations will get priority for UK and US leftover doses. It wouldn't be fair for us to give aid to first world nations that made mistakes in their purchasing strategies instead of nations that simply don't have the means.
Also good to see that 500k jabs have been done, that feels like an acceleration to me, around 75k per day in the last two days. We need to double that at least in early January.
The GSK/Sanofi failure is what has left the EU so heavily reliant on CureVac or waiting until late in 2021 for Pfizer capacity.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
"More theoretically, we can take heart from the way the immune system works. As well as B-cells which make antibodies, we have two other kinds of T-cells. One kind I think of as Stasi-like secret policemen. “They basically knock on the door of every cell and say ‘show me segments of all the proteins you have inside you’,” says Birney. “And if it finds one it hasn’t seen before, it decides it’s a virus and presses the ‘please commit suicide’ button’.”
Love this.
What was that French kids cartoon about the body where the red blood cells were people who constantly hiked around the body and the white blood cells were in police cars??
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
I’m friends with a friend who has a friend at Porton Down. They are very much on the case
People often assume he doesn't bother, not realising that he carefully makes sure it looks messed up (and, nowadays, carefully pulls some of it over the top) before going on stage.
Yes, he is clearly suffering hair loss
Embrace your baldness Boris - go for the number one all over like the rest of us slap heads!!
Not sure he has the head shape to pull that look off. Someone showed a photo of him in a beanie that covered his hair completely and he was unrecognizable as well.
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
We don;t even know for certain if the new strain is 70% quicker or not.
Shagger Ferguson's NERVTAG committee has high confidence it is. Yesterday it was moderate confidence.
But then Shagger has had high confidence in all sorts of things that have turned out to be complete fantasy based on rubbish modelling.
Vallance made it very clear that the existing Tiers will need to be ramped up to T4 to keep the neo-Covid under control. How about starting on Boxing Day like in Scotland?
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
What was that French kids cartoon about the body where the red blood cells were people who constantly hiked around the body and the white blood cells were in police cars??
Portsmouth in tier 4, Fareham in tier 2? Tier 2!!! Huh?
I've got rellies in SE Hampshire, who have two theories. One is that Fareham Borough has a big rural hinterland bringing the overall average down, even if it would be logical to include Fareham Town in the Plague Zone. The other dark mutterings are that the AG is MP for Fareham, which outranks being Fred Dinenage's daughter, junior health minister and MP for Gosport.
An utterly deluded approach, if true, which has been proved, on a number of occasions, to be the single quickest way to infect your constituency. See GM at the start of the tier system.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
I am off today, and have been given some chores to complete, so here I am! On days with clients, accessing PB can sometimes appear rude. When I am in the office and my business partner is out I craftily log onto PB, but only when I am alone. Although that sounds a little like how internet porn enthusiasts manage their addiction.
Anyway the good news is we reconfigured the office last week. All four desks are on the one wall and my computer screen now faces the back wall (it was facing every one else's workstation) so I can spend all day on PB and it will look like I am working.
When I was working for a certain large multinational, in the early days of the web, I was careful not to do any browsing around on company time.
A couple of years into the job, I had made friends with the infrastructure people (get to know the people who "hold the building up" is a habit of mine.
The subject of work surveillance came up. One of the system admin told me I was OK either way - he ran a script to delete the external browsing habits of friends of his from the logs.... and had included me.....
Had a similar one when I was in Telecomms.
Engineering Director of a big Telecomms setup had had a moral panic and stood up on his hind legs: "Anyone who views this stuff on the web will be SACKED!!! (waves arms)".
A bit later he had to sack his 20 year experience head system tester who had been in on a Saturday doing testing on a new release to get it out of the door to meet the promises made by the sales team. It took a minute or so for the system to process each test case, so had been browsing 'the web' in between.
Chap was working on contract for a rival 4 days later on double the money.
This was pre-1996, so pre all the various fits about contractor pay, taxes etc.
That’s when they might split, quite easily. See how the Nats on here already divide between Sturgeon-admirers, and those who openly detest her.
I'm surprised this seems to be flying under the radar so far. The sheer amount of vitriol being exchanged beteen the various nat factions is extordinary, the comments sectons on some nat blogs are like war zones. Sturgeon is public enemny number one with a good chunk of indy activists, who seem to regard her as some kind of unionist secret agent.
Vallance made it very clear that the existing Tiers will need to be ramped up to T4 to keep the neo-Covid under control. How about starting on Boxing Day like in Scotland?
If we're going to do that, there's no point waiting. It should happen immediately.
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
Everything crossed.
1%+ fully vaccinated by early January in the most vulnerable groups should really be showing up in lower death figures in early Feb.
Vallance made it very clear that the existing Tiers will need to be ramped up to T4 to keep the neo-Covid under control. How about starting on Boxing Day like in Scotland?
If the new super duper variant is already in all these places, how can Tier 4 stop the spread?
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
Do you agree that the UK has done better than the EU on ordering, approving and rolling out the vaccine?
Interesting that he speculates that the strain is more transmissable because it hangs around in the body for a bit longer, rather than, say, some innate advantage making it more infectious in identical circumstances. If he is right, that doesn't sound so bad as far as precautions are concerned.
Also that we were lucky to spot it here, because the mutation has by chance negated one of the three tests.
Portsmouth in tier 4, Fareham in tier 2? Tier 2!!! Huh?
I'm in Tier 4; tier 2 starts about a mile down the road for us.
In tier top trumps - I live in a town on a river, the middle of the bridge outwards is in one T4 county (shutting a couple of pubs), and 250m to the north there's a second T2 county, then 1km south the first T4 county curls round.
So my favourite pub ends up being 10m away from being in one T4 county, and 150m away from being in a second! We're in T2.
Portsmouth in tier 4, Fareham in tier 2? Tier 2!!! Huh?
I've got rellies in SE Hampshire, who have two theories. One is that Fareham Borough has a big rural hinterland bringing the overall average down, even if it would be logical to include Fareham Town in the Plague Zone. The other dark mutterings are that the AG is MP for Fareham, which outranks being Fred Dinenage's daughter, junior health minister and MP for Gosport.
The hard truth is you have to draw the boundaries somewhere.
If they did it for the ceremonial county of Hampshire because of the Solent area then it'd be disproportionate and most of the county would be pissed.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
Everything crossed.
1%+ fully vaccinated by early January in the most vulnerable groups should really be showing up in lower death figures in early Feb.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
Do you agree that the UK has done better than the EU on ordering, approving and rolling out the vaccine?
Interesting that he speculates that the strain is more transmissable because it hangs around in the body for a bit longer, rather than, say, some innate advantage making it more infectious in identical circumstances. If he is right, that doesn't sound so bad as far as precautions are concerned.
Also that we were lucky to spot it here, because the mutation has by chance negated one of the three tests.
Yes, I found that somewhat reassuring.
The media (with their great scientific ignorance) doesn't help here implying that if it's 70% more contagious it must have put on a cape and can now leap 20m and bitchslap your mum through two masks and a helmet.
People often assume he doesn't bother, not realising that he carefully makes sure it looks messed up (and, nowadays, carefully pulls some of it over the top) before going on stage.
Yes, he is clearly suffering hair loss
Embrace your baldness Boris - go for the number one all over like the rest of us slap heads!!
Not sure he has the head shape to pull that look off. Someone showed a photo of him in a beanie that covered his hair completely and he was unrecognizable as well.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
And of course it is massively more than 1% in terms of 'bang for the buck', if you excuse the inappropriate metaphor. We are already at the point where we've vaccinated (albeit first dose only) nearly 8% of the groups who account for two-thirds of the deaths (i.e. the 6.5 million people in the government's priority groups 1 and 2) plus front-line healthcare workers.
Although things are going to be very grim for the next couple of months, we're actually well on the way to winning this war. If we get more vaccine availability, we might be in an even better position quite soon.
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
Everything crossed.
1%+ fully vaccinated by early January in the most vulnerable groups should really be showing up in lower death figures in early Feb.
LOL and if they aren't. Forever lockdown?
It is likely the AZ vaccine is approved next week or the week after next, then that will be a genuine game changer for the UK, lockdowns will ease and be a thing of the past by the summer.
Portsmouth in tier 4, Fareham in tier 2? Tier 2!!! Huh?
I've got rellies in SE Hampshire, who have two theories. One is that Fareham Borough has a big rural hinterland bringing the overall average down, even if it would be logical to include Fareham Town in the Plague Zone. The other dark mutterings are that the AG is MP for Fareham, which outranks being Fred Dinenage's daughter, junior health minister and MP for Gosport.
The hard truth is you have to draw the boundaries somewhere.
If they did it for the ceremonial county of Hampshire because of the Solent area then it'd be disproportionate and most of the county would be pissed.
I am just painting up my "Go Back to North Island" placard ready to go stand down by the ferry terminal.
That’s when they might split, quite easily. See how the Nats on here already divide between Sturgeon-admirers, and those who openly detest her.
I'm surprised this seems to be flying under the radar so far. The sheer amount of vitriol being exchanged beteen the various nat factions is extordinary, the comments sectons on some nat blogs are like war zones. Sturgeon is public enemny number one with a good chunk of indy activists, who seem to regard her as some kind of unionist secret agent.
Brexit and covid are battlefield smoke. Disguising the bitter Nat skirmishing.
It will reveal itself in the end, because it is so vicious. It’s not just the call-UDI stuff, it’s internecine fighting over the Salmond trial, and much else. It is also inevitable in what is, at present, basically a one party state. When there is no actual opposition, political warring is internalised within the solitary governing party. Human nature.
It is deeply unhealthy for Scotland and when indyref2 is denied I hope they come out and have their stramash in public. It will be cleansing for them
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
25 weeks is a few weeks?
I presume he is taking into account tests already done....
48 million tests so far....
Population of 67 million.
So a bit less than 7 weeks to pass 67 million tests...
That’s when they might split, quite easily. See how the Nats on here already divide between Sturgeon-admirers, and those who openly detest her.
I'm surprised this seems to be flying under the radar so far. The sheer amount of vitriol being exchanged beteen the various nat factions is extordinary, the comments sectons on some nat blogs are like war zones. Sturgeon is public enemny number one with a good chunk of indy activists, who seem to regard her as some kind of unionist secret agent.
Neither Eck or Nippy has given evidence to the inquiry yet. Even Murrell managed to contradict his wife, so will be interesting to see what her former best mate does.
The SNP have been almost supernaturally fortunate in how Covid has wiped all this stuff off the headlines. Even the drugs death disaster was overtaken by SuperCovid. Quite extraordinary.
Well, that press conference merits a one-word summary, to quote the PM. Alas.
I have this feeling the press conference was arranged to announce a deal with the French about the hold up at Dover but I think Macron wasn't going to be bounced into anything.
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
Everything crossed.
1%+ fully vaccinated by early January in the most vulnerable groups should really be showing up in lower death figures in early Feb.
LOL and if they aren't. Forever lockdown?
It is likely the AZ vaccine is approved next week or the week after next, then that will be a genuine game changer for the UK, lockdowns will ease and be a thing of the past by the summer.
Britain has the best genetic surveillance of disease in the world, as measured in viral genomes sequenced per capita; that’s not a boast, it’s simply the case. It is very possible that the new strain is spreading rapidly in France, the Netherlands, Belgium and so on, but the surveillance is less effective at spotting it. It’s another reason why we need to improve surveillance everywhere.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
25 weeks is a few weeks?
I presume he is taking into account tests already done....
48 million tests so far....
Population of 67 million.
So a bit less than 7 weeks to pass 67 million tests...
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
Everything crossed.
1%+ fully vaccinated by early January in the most vulnerable groups should really be showing up in lower death figures in early Feb.
LOL and if they aren't. Forever lockdown?
It is likely the AZ vaccine is approved next week or the week after next, then that will be a genuine game changer for the UK, lockdowns will ease and be a thing of the past by the summer.
Not even if Chris Grayling could screw that up.
You are forgetting the vaccine-resistant mutant ninja turtle strain that will discovered by Shagger Ferguson's committee in the new year. Or Covid 20. Or whatever.
That’s when they might split, quite easily. See how the Nats on here already divide between Sturgeon-admirers, and those who openly detest her.
I'm surprised this seems to be flying under the radar so far. The sheer amount of vitriol being exchanged beteen the various nat factions is extordinary, the comments sectons on some nat blogs are like war zones. Sturgeon is public enemny number one with a good chunk of indy activists, who seem to regard her as some kind of unionist secret agent.
Brexit and covid are battlefield smoke. Disguising the bitter Nat skirmishing.
It will reveal itself in the end, because it is so vicious. It’s not just the call-UDI stuff, it’s internecine fighting over the Salmond trial, and much else. It is also inevitable in what is, at present, basically a one party state. When there is no actual opposition, political warring is internalised within the solitary governing party. Human nature.
It is deeply unhealthy for Scotland and when indyref2 is denied I hope they come out and have their stramash in public. It will be cleansing for them
"One party state"?! It's a minority government with plenty of coalitions, often including or controlled by other parties, at local government level. Never mind UK level.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
25 weeks is a few weeks?
Tests already done. Derrrrrr
You need to work on your writing skills, you need to be clearer in what you write and avoid ambiguity.
We need to build a wall and make Londoners and the South pay for it.
Looking at this, and Malmesbury’s excellent data, it is striking how R0 does NOT correlate with relative poverty. The richest parts of England are the most infected, some of the poorest parts of the UK have some of the lowest covid rates in the country.
Really? I was some years back on a holiday in Kent - inter aliis looked at a NT cottage in the Werald, stayed overnight in Maidstone and drove to Chatham for the nautical archaeology and Rochester Castle. I was struck by the disparities in wealth and income as we went throiugh it - Jessica's Pony's field alternating with grim proletarian pockets.
Sure. Kent is extremely mixed. Great wealth next door to proper deprivation. Same goes for essex.
But look at the stats: the new bug has taken hold across all of london and the Home/southern Counties. And that is the richest part of the country. Indeed London is the richest part of Europe
Surprising that a virus does not check your wallet and doff its cap before selection.
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
I’m friends with a friend who has a friend at Porton Down. They are very much on the case
So many friends all working on it sounds most positive.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
25 weeks is a few weeks?
Tests already done. Derrrrrr
Congratulations on your new username if it hasn't been noted yet. It's a topsy turvy Christmas for us all.
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
Everything crossed.
1%+ fully vaccinated by early January in the most vulnerable groups should really be showing up in lower death figures in early Feb.
LOL and if they aren't. Forever lockdown?
It is likely the AZ vaccine is approved next week or the week after next, then that will be a genuine game changer for the UK, lockdowns will ease and be a thing of the past by the summer.
Not even if Chris Grayling could screw that up.
You are forgetting the vaccine-resistant mutant ninja turtle strain that will discovered by Shagger Ferguson's committee in the new year. Or Covid 20. Or whatever.
Oh right, I guess you'll keep on banging on about why we should be following Sweden right?
Portsmouth in tier 4, Fareham in tier 2? Tier 2!!! Huh?
I've got rellies in SE Hampshire, who have two theories. One is that Fareham Borough has a big rural hinterland bringing the overall average down, even if it would be logical to include Fareham Town in the Plague Zone. The other dark mutterings are that the AG is MP for Fareham, which outranks being Fred Dinenage's daughter, junior health minister and MP for Gosport.
The hard truth is you have to draw the boundaries somewhere.
If they did it for the ceremonial county of Hampshire because of the Solent area then it'd be disproportionate and most of the county would be pissed.
That's certainly true. However, knowing the geography of the area (there's a ferry between Gosport and Portsmouth, but the only land link is via Fareham) and the reality that the only thing keeping people in the black zone is honour, the boundary around Portsmouth/Gosport/Fareham/Havant is logical in a way that Portsmouth/Gosport/Havant isn't. And whilst Fareham might not technically qualify, a lot of the problems the UK has had have come from consistently erring on the too little / too late side of things.
Unionist desperation knows no bounds, tag team of the great clunking duffer and Bozo the Clown, independence will be at short odds for sure.
Seems you are going to have a longer wait for indy2 with Brown and Starmer teaming up and refusing to support it through the HOC
You seem to have got over your recent ‘blocking a referendum would be undemocratic’ spasm. Can we now expect you to participate in HYUFD’s baton wielding B Specials for the Union?
I don't think indyref2 is legally dependent on a House of Commons mandate. If you read the legal arguments for a referendum, regardless of what Westminster thinks, it seems reasonably strong.
Before anyone jumps in with 'that's what it says in law' I would point you to some of the complex arguments being advanced which may well by-pass Westminster.
If Westminster refuses one it would have as much effect as the Catalan referendum in defiance of Madrid, ie none
Spain is used to Franco authoritarianism.
Britain is a proud centuries old democracy.
If the mother of all Parliament's turns to Francoism then that would be to betray everything that is Great about Britain.
Wrong, Spain never even allowed Catalonia one legal independence vote.
Westminster allowed the Scots one in 2014, they voted 55% to stay in the UK in that 'once in a generation' referendum
Under British Parliamentary Democracy there is an overriding principle quite rightly that No Parliament can bind it's successors.
Whatever the Scottish voters elect in 2021 is their choice. Not yours. If that contradicts promises in 2014 so be it. That is why no Parliament can bind it's successors.
Either you respect democracy or you do not. Democracy is not a once in a generation event.
The Scottish referendum is in the sole purview of Westminster. It’s up to the Westminster parliament if they wish to grant it or not. They can take into account the composition of the Scottish Parliament if they do choose but it’s not the only factor
Har Har, imagine you supporting colonial rule in a supposedly equal union , who would have believed it.
Looks like we're coming up to 1% of the nation who've had the first part of Pfizer.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
The rollout's been impressive so far. I thought being first to approve it might have been meaningless in practice but we do seem to be making decent progress.
UK testing is now quite impressive, as well. We’re doing 400,000+ tests A DAY. In a few weeks we will have tested the equivalent of the entire UK population
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
25 weeks is a few weeks?
Tests already done. Derrrrrr
Congratulations on your new username if it hasn't been noted yet. It's a topsy turvy Christmas for us all.
He only changed two of the letters, gradually becoming less anonymous
Given the infection figures and the rate of spreading, plus the fact that we've already given the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to 500,000 people, we should very soon be able to give some pretty definitive answers to the questions about how much protection the vaccine gives against the new strain, and also get a very good idea of whether it prevents asymptomatic infections which can spread to others. I do hope that the boffins are gathering the necessary data.
I’m friends with a friend who has a friend at Porton Down. They are very much on the case
So many friends all working on it sounds most positive.
Comments
Though I give them (and any government) a little leeway in bigging up good news on vaccines. They are, after all, our only way out, and encouraging people to get vaccinated is a good thing.
Relieved I'm not playing the presser drinking game today...
Shame he doesn't have the judgment to match.
In Britain we are all mixed up. Council estates right by million pound mansions. We share the country. We walk the same pavements and play in the same parks.
France is insane, the way it carefully sequesters the poor.
Everyone knows this happens in Paris - the suburbs are the places of banishment - but it happens everywhere. Lyon is a great example. I went there 2 years ago and thought wow, what a beautiful rich old city, France is so lucky, everyone is middle class and all the women have Hermes scarves.
Total crap of course. The other day I met a young woman who taught in Lyon. She commuted OUT from the bourgeois city centre to the multi cultural distant suburbs, she told me the poverty is dire.
But tourists never see it. Because it is banished from sight. See Roger’s comment earlier today about Paris being a ‘beautiful small walkable capital city’. He is just oblivious to the 80% of Paris outside le peripherique
A little bit of humility would go a long way. I say the same for Boris who should admit that the government has got it wrong on test/track/trace/isolation and keeping the border open all this time. That he won't is why I'll never vote for him or the Tories while he is still leader.
Also, this Boris conference has been utterly pointless.
https://twitter.com/faisalislam/status/1341072331851100160?s=20
Although in a case I am involved in its been confirmed that there are currently no cases of the new variant recorded in Lothian.
The setback to the Sanofi/GSK effort was most disappointing.
That's excellent. A must read.
A damning article, indeed, particularly vis-a-vis the EC.
Better than a kick in the teeth.
Embrace your baldness Boris - go for the number one all over like the rest of us slap heads!!
https://twitter.com/CovidGenomicsUK/status/1341073233420955654?s=20
The global total of identified variants is 270,000 - and of course many of these 20,000 won't be new - but its still very impressive.
Also good to see that 500k jabs have been done, that feels like an acceleration to me, around 75k per day in the last two days. We need to double that at least in early January.
The GSK/Sanofi failure is what has left the EU so heavily reliant on CureVac or waiting until late in 2021 for Pfizer capacity.
Love this.
What was that French kids cartoon about the body where the red blood cells were people who constantly hiked around the body and the white blood cells were in police cars??
That one?
Shagger Ferguson's NERVTAG committee has high confidence it is. Yesterday it was moderate confidence.
But then Shagger has had high confidence in all sorts of things that have turned out to be complete fantasy based on rubbish modelling.
https://twitter.com/itvnews/status/1341075330753318917?s=20
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Once_Upon_a_Time..._Life
I think i might have seen it as a child, looking at the clips on Youtube.
See GM at the start of the tier system.
We have screwed up many things. But not everything
Engineering Director of a big Telecomms setup had had a moral panic and stood up on his hind legs: "Anyone who views this stuff on the web will be SACKED!!! (waves arms)".
A bit later he had to sack his 20 year experience head system tester who had been in on a Saturday doing testing on a new release to get it out of the door to meet the promises made by the sales team. It took a minute or so for the system to process each test case, so had been browsing 'the web' in between.
Chap was working on contract for a rival 4 days later on double the money.
This was pre-1996, so pre all the various fits about contractor pay, taxes etc.
1%+ fully vaccinated by early January in the most vulnerable groups should really be showing up in lower death figures in early Feb.
Also that we were lucky to spot it here, because the mutation has by chance negated one of the three tests.
So my favourite pub ends up being 10m away from being in one T4 county, and 150m away from being in a second! We're in T2.
If they did it for the ceremonial county of Hampshire because of the Solent area then it'd be disproportionate and most of the county would be pissed.
https://twitter.com/TheCGPS/status/1340645401632911369
I note that it is Glasgow, even if not yet identified in Lothian.
The media (with their great scientific ignorance) doesn't help here implying that if it's 70% more contagious it must have put on a cape and can now leap 20m and bitchslap your mum through two masks and a helmet.
https://i2-prod.grimsbytelegraph.co.uk/incoming/article4797142.ece/ALTERNATES/s810/2_boris-hat-canva.jpg
Although things are going to be very grim for the next couple of months, we're actually well on the way to winning this war. If we get more vaccine availability, we might be in an even better position quite soon.
Not even if Chris Grayling could screw that up.
It will reveal itself in the end, because it is so vicious. It’s not just the call-UDI stuff, it’s internecine fighting over the Salmond trial, and much else. It is also inevitable in what is, at present, basically a one party state. When there is no actual opposition, political warring is internalised within the solitary governing party. Human nature.
It is deeply unhealthy for Scotland and when indyref2 is denied I hope they come out and have their stramash in public. It will be cleansing for them
48 million tests so far....
Population of 67 million.
So a bit less than 7 weeks to pass 67 million tests...
The SNP have been almost supernaturally fortunate in how Covid has wiped all this stuff off the headlines. Even the drugs death disaster was overtaken by SuperCovid. Quite extraordinary.
https://twitter.com/JakeSherman/status/1341078170754310144
It's a topsy turvy Christmas for us all.