It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
That's a good way of putting it. Although I would say "PB Tories" are about equally split and there are some capable of a bit of both. Which is ok. Ultra consistency is a sign of something untoward in a person.
I would say that on the vaccine issue, the important point is that is not a choice between
- vaccinate the UK - vaccinate the world.
We can, should and almost certainly will, do both.
The old pizza economic metaphor applies here - it's not how much pizza that is currently on the table, it's about ordering more pizza.
Yes, the EU has decided it wants to have more slices of one pizza, the US and UK have decided to simply order more pizzas.
The contrast of those approaches is why the EU programme is stuck at 2-3% in similarly sized countries while we're at 14% and the US is at 9%.
Bearing in mind that our per capita vaccine investment is similar to the US, the difference between their 9% and our 14% is interesting.
Some combination of the advantage of a centralised NHS for the task of mass vaccination and not having a disruptive political transition, perhaps. Be interesting to see to what extent, if any, the US manages to close the gap as the effects from the transition fade.
The US program is rather chaotic - you have the Federal/State split, plus Trump, plus high levels of demented anti-vax.
So the US ordered lots of vaccine. They have a very large, but disorganised and fragmented medical system - so lots and lots of people at the front end to give vaccinations.
From what I've been able to gather, the Federal part is a mess, but delivering vaccine. The State end is a mess, but generally getting the vaccine to people. The result is very very uneven.
A properly organised program would be able to do much more.
The state that appears to have sorted itself out best is, remarkably, West Virgina.
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
That's a good way of putting it. Although I would say "PB Tories" are about equally split and there are some capable of a bit of both. Which is ok. Ultra consistency is a sign of something untoward in a person.
I would say that on the vaccine issue, the important point is that is not a choice between
- vaccinate the UK - vaccinate the world.
We can, should and almost certainly will, do both.
The old pizza economic metaphor applies here - it's not how much pizza that is currently on the table, it's about ordering more pizza.
Yes, the EU has decided it wants to have more slices of one pizza, the US and UK have decided to simply order more pizzas.
The contrast of those approaches is why the EU programme is stuck at 2-3% in similarly sized countries while we're at 14% and the US is at 9%.
Bearing in mind that our per capita vaccine investment is similar to the US, the difference between their 9% and our 14% is interesting.
Some combination of the advantage of a centralised NHS for the task of mass vaccination and not having a disruptive political transition, perhaps. Be interesting to see to what extent, if any, the US manages to close the gap as the effects from the transition fade.
The US program is rather chaotic - you have the Federal/State split, plus Trump, plus high levels of demented anti-vax.
So the US ordered lots of vaccine. They have a very large, but disorganised and fragmented medical system - so lots and lots of people at the front end to give vaccinations.
From what I've been able to gather, the Federal part is a mess, but delivering vaccine. The State end is a mess, but generally getting the vaccine to people. The result is very very uneven.
A properly organised program would be able to do much more.
The state that appears to have sorted itself out best is, remarkably, West Virgina.
Maybe all those "free clinics" writing Oxy scrips have been repurposed.
This makes intuitive sense - if you've already had Covid, a single vaccine shot seems to act as a booster vaccine shot would otherwise.
Had Covid? You May Need Only One Dose of Vaccine, Study Suggests https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/01/health/have-you-had-covid-19-coronavirus.html ...“I think one vaccination should be sufficient,” said Florian Krammer, a virologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and an author on the study. “This would also spare individuals from unnecessary pain when getting the second dose and it would free up additional vaccine doses.”...
...other immunologists suggest everyone stick to two doses. “I’m a big proponent of the right dosing and right schedule, because that’s how the studies were performed,” said Maria Elena Bottazzi, an immunologist at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston...
They have completely lost their marbles. Got to be Brexit Derangement Syndrome.
Even if she is right that we rushed it and risked safety (which she is most certainly not), then the fact that 9million and counting UK citizens have had the jab without anyone falling over dead is as a pretty good clue that the two in question are safe enough in the circumstances.
How many does she want in a clinical trial? 20million?
Michelle O'Neill on -33% and Michael Martin on -21%.
The highest rating is +63% for Health Minister and former UUP leader Robin Swann, Sturgeon's rating is largely irrelevant as she is Scottish not Northern Irish and not part of either the UK or Irish governments
"Scotland is irrelevant to Northern Island" is the kind of hard hitting, clear headed political analysis I come here for.
On Friday when after Article 16 was revoked and before the European Commission retreated, when it was roundly criticised by the British Government, the Irish Government, the NI First Minister, Tories, Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, Irish parties, DUP, Sinn Fein, SDLP and Alliance . . . did the SNP have anything to say on the matter?
Err...what?
'Let me interject some chalk into this cheese talk.'
Alistair refuted the idea that "Scotland is irrelevant to Northern Island" - so I'm wondering what the SNP had to say on possibly the only time ever that every single party relevant to Northern Ireland, Britain and Ireland were all united and speaking as one.
Did Sturgeon or a spokesperson or anyone else from the SNP chip in - in the time period between A16 being invoked and it being withdrawn? When every single party relevant to Northern Ireland did and unanimously on the same side?
Or did the SNP decide that Scotland was irrelevant to Northern Ireland?
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
Just to confirm I am very much in the Global Britain cohort and credit Liz Truss for her successes and her formal application yesterday to join TPP
Does anyone have an estimate for how long this may take?
Is performative xenophobia better or worse than just xenophobia?
That's also a rather silly tweet. Being in the EU, vaccines aside, is probably in our better interest but its certainly not merely a trade bloc. That's part of its pitch, about how much more integrated it is than a trade bloc.
Brexit supporters largely support free trade, were reluctant to get rid of the free trade aspects of the EU as a trade association, and many oppose protectionism like the EU protectionism against some of the world's poorest people. The vote gave everyone an impossible forced choice between two highly imperfect situations when a large majority wanted a reformed EU - not on the ballot.
I don't think this is right at all. Sure the elite Brexit supporters want free trade but the Brexit core in the red wall wants protectionism. They want their jobs protected and manufacturing brought back to the UK.
We aren't going to have protectionism.
It's overly simplistic for you and HYUFD to say the red wall wants protectionism or they want a halt to migration.
People want to be listened to, respected and have their lives improve. How that happens isn't as significant as that it does. Most people aren't political extremist obsessives one way or another.
Spot on.
The debate has been wrecked by the myth that there are 17 million extremists in the UK, all voting Brexit. Nearly all Remain and Leave voters are moderates.
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
Why not?
Given the world needs billions of doses, not millions of doses; given that getting full normality here means we can send more hundreds of millions of doses to the rest of the world rather than just a couple of million to the rest of the world . . .
. . . why do you want to hurt the rest of the world by not finishing the job here?
It's a speed and priority thing not an either/or. And since you're so fond of absurdly reductive, loaded questions, I will pose YOU one -
Why do you want to hamper the global vaccination effort - and by implication prolong the pandemic and increase the risk of malign mutations - by refusing to release any of our copious stocks and pipeline until we are 100% sorted ourselves even if that takes ages and even then (indeed especially then) we can't open our borders and have to live for years like Vincent Price in The Masque of the Red Death?
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
They have completely lost their marbles. Got to be Brexit Derangement Syndrome.
Even if she is right that we rushed it and risked safety (which she is most certainly not), then the fact that 9million and counting UK citizens have had the jab without anyone falling over dead is as a pretty good clue that the two in question are safe enough in the circumstances.
How many does she want in a clinical trial? 20million?
To be strictly factual - the safety trials, which were long before the efficacy trials, proved that the various vaccines wouldn't kill or maim people.
This is why it was moral and ethical to embark on the mass efficacy trials. Which were signed off by the various regulators, round the world, on the basis of the results of the safety trials.
Michelle O'Neill on -33% and Michael Martin on -21%.
The highest rating is +63% for Health Minister and former UUP leader Robin Swann, Sturgeon's rating is largely irrelevant as she is Scottish not Northern Irish and not part of either the UK or Irish governments
"Scotland is irrelevant to Northern Island" is the kind of hard hitting, clear headed political analysis I come here for.
On Friday when after Article 16 was revoked and before the European Commission retreated, when it was roundly criticised by the British Government, the Irish Government, the NI First Minister, Tories, Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, Irish parties, DUP, Sinn Fein, SDLP and Alliance . . . did the SNP have anything to say on the matter?
Err...what?
'Let me interject some chalk into this cheese talk.'
Alistair refuted the idea that "Scotland is irrelevant to Northern Island" - so I'm wondering what the SNP had to say on possibly the only time ever that every single party relevant to Northern Ireland, Britain and Ireland were all united and speaking as one.
Did Sturgeon or a spokesperson or anyone else from the SNP chip in - in the time period between A16 being invoked and it being withdrawn? When every single party relevant to Northern Ireland did and unanimously on the same side?
Or did the SNP decide that Scotland was irrelevant to Northern Ireland?
Personally I feel he was ripping the pish out of dim observations from simpletons but I'm sure he can speak for himself. Please feel free to carry on reading into it whatever you wish however.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
They are focussed on surviving the next few weeks?
Of course that assumes they can be got rid of.............................
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
Just to confirm I am very much in the Global Britain cohort and credit Liz Truss for her successes and her formal application yesterday to join TPP
Can you spot the deliberate mistake with the grouping Liz is trying to join
'It is a trade agreement between 11 Pacific Rim nations: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam'.
Liz Truss should get together with Gavin Williamson. They can form a new MENSA group in the Tory Party
Your last sentence is disgusting
Using mental health to make an argument is so low but then why am I surprised
And when the US joins TPP this group of countries will see a huge increase in tariff free trade
MENSA is a measure of intelligence, not mental health. What are you on about?
Yes - I thought that - though some of the actual members.............
Oh, and which of us didn't predict exactly this - weeks back?
The EU seem to only just be waking up to the fact there are two communities in Northern Ireland to worry about.
I don't recall the EU placing an intra-UK border down the Irish Sea. They had a proposal to get around the whole issue which was rejected massively and repeatedly by the 2017 parliament.
Because the 2017 solution was even worse. The NI Protocol subjugating NI to rules they don't vote for is bad and the solution is to find a way out of that mess for NI.
Instead the 2017 solution was to apply the bad protocol for NI to the entire UK simultaneously. That's worse.
That's like saying the solution for one person being sick is to make everyone sick.
GB is out of the Protocol now, good, so now we need to find a way to extract NI out of it too.
And how do we do that? We're back to either invent the world's first digital customs border, or the GFA collapses and potentially the peace. The Intra-Irish border was always the unsquareable circle. If UK was to diverge from the EU and the Irish border must remain open, then NI could no longer be a full part of the UK.
Easy.
If those are the choices then the option is obvious: We invent the world's first digital customs border.
Because the alternative: The GFA collapses and potentially the peace is worse.
That should have been the obvious solution all along, but regrettably years were wasted with the idea of keeping the UK in the EU's customs border. Thankfully that idea was killed before birth. So now we have the Protocol, which reality is showing isn't viable.
The pressure now is where it always should have been. Ireland isn't going to join the UK, the UK isn't going to join the UK, we want peace - Once you've eliminated the impossible the only option left, however improbable, is the solution. A digital system is all that is left.
Trusted traders, self-declarations and a mutual recognition of SPS rather than demanding SPS checks be done. Do that etc and its job done.
We are not there yet but if (i) vaccines are in limited supply and (ii) the UK has vaccinated sufficiently to control the virus and substantially reopen, it not IMMORAL (in fact it is quite the contrary) to argue that the priority should then be in countries where the virus is raging.
Furthermore this is the most rational approach for a global pandemic. It must be defeated globally otherwise it will be back to bite us with vicious imported mutations and we will be stuck in this twilight world for years.
The header is great but is playing to the gallery.
As Cyclefree and others have said, it would be 100% immoral.
The UK vaccines are owned collectively by the UK population, who as both citizens and taxpayers have paid for and are entitled to receive their share. To take away that share from the younger half without their consent - as both you and the WHO have proposed - is to perpetrate a theft upon them, plain and simple. And not just the usual socialist theft of income or assets - which is bad enough, but which after all is only money - but a theft of their freedom, their physical and mental health, their ability to breathe easily and live normal lives.
That the proponents of such a theft include those who would receive their doses themselves before merrily giving away those of others is more than immoral - it's sick. I don't see any of them volunteering to have their doses sent overseas right now to protect the elderly in poor countries with no healthcare system at all, which is what they would be arguing for if they wished to accept the logical consequences of their lofty 'moral' stance rather than have the young pay the price for their ideals.
Some people are arguing not for us to send them to poor countries but to the EU......
Who wouldn't want them anyway because they might be unsafe, but best they steal them from us in any event.... for some reason.
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
I don't think we need 'everyone done' first either - that's a waste of time that would leave doses stockpiled. But we do need a full vaccination -secured- for every person in the UK. Once that's locked in, let's have at Covid worldwide.
Sorry, don't follow. What's the difference between "everyone done" and "full vaccination secured for every person"?
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
Depends how you count Covid cases. I have serious doubts that everyone is counting the same way
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
Thankfully you are not in charge of vaccine disposition
I'll be writing to my MP though. And possibly to the papers too.
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
Why not?
Given the world needs billions of doses, not millions of doses; given that getting full normality here means we can send more hundreds of millions of doses to the rest of the world rather than just a couple of million to the rest of the world . . .
. . . why do you want to hurt the rest of the world by not finishing the job here?
It's a speed and priority thing not an either/or. And since you're so fond of absurdly reductive, loaded questions, I will pose YOU one -
Why do you want to hamper the global vaccination effort - and by implication prolong the pandemic and increase the risk of malign mutations - by refusing to release any of our copious stocks and pipeline until we are 100% sorted ourselves even if that takes ages and even then (indeed especially then) we can't open our borders and have to live for years like Vincent Price in The Masque of the Red Death?
I don't want to hamper the global vaccination effort. The UK being fully vaccinated is in the best interests of of the global vaccination effort.
The UK not being fully vaccinated, so the UK isn't fully open domestically, so the UK economy is suppressed, so the UK's supply of global vaccine aid is suppressed hurts not helps the global vaccination effort.
Eight weeks of the UK being fully vaccinated would add £48bn of the UK GDP and add £240mn to the UK's foreign aid budget, let alone anything else we choose to spend. That's enough for us to add 120 million extra doses to global vaccination efforts, more than the amount of doses the UK is going to use domestically.
Why would you deny the rest of the world that aid from us?
We don't have "copious stocks", we are using all the stocks we get in. So that's delusional in thinking the UK can divert some "copious stocks" - any stocks we have should be used.
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
Just to confirm I am very much in the Global Britain cohort and credit Liz Truss for her successes and her formal application yesterday to join TPP
Can you spot the deliberate mistake with the grouping Liz is trying to join
'It is a trade agreement between 11 Pacific Rim nations: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam'.
Liz Truss should get together with Gavin Williamson. They can form a new MENSA group in the Tory Party
Your last sentence is disgusting
Using mental health to make an argument is so low but then why am I surprised
And when the US joins TPP this group of countries will see a huge increase in tariff free trade
G , your appetite for chlorinated chicken and hormone full beef surprises me?
As you are so good at numbers , could you oblige with the death rates and positivity rates for same countries , we can then do a real comparison of who is doing well rather than your Tory cult ideas of success.
Deflect, blame, ignore.
You don't want the Scottish government to improve its rate of vaccination?
I want them to improve of course, but yet again you highlight your bias with your selective numbers. I am happy that Scotland has lower death rate , lower positivity rate and lower vaccination rate. I look at the big picture , you on the other hand ignore the devastating other numbers and focus on the one good part. When we are all vaccinated , Scotland a week or so behind England but England still having 40% higher death rate and probably world champions, will you still be crowing.
Sounds like you are the one crowing about deaths in England. Unless you've got a time machine you can't change the past - all we can change is the present and the future - but you and the SNP seem very defensive over Scotland's slower vaccination rate, now the "care homes first" rationale has run out of road.
Trying to avoid the point yet again. Post the numbers or prove that you are a ne'er do well. I know for a fact you will not post the real data, cowards like you just hide in the shadows and post misinformation. Not very pleasant.
I'm sure you can google like anyone else - I'm not your data service. Yes, the death numbers in England are worse - for many reasons, some of which will be government (in)action, others will not.
The point is "where we are today" and "what we could do better". Which you don't want to engage with. Lets hope the new "super centres" in Aberdeen & Edinburgh pick up the pace, but there's a lot of pace to pick up.
Yes you only want to discuss selected data , we know you of old. I prefer to look at all the data and do not pick the small part that is good for my point. For sure I am certain you will never post anything positive about Scotland. I will continue to view your data in with that in mind, knowing it will at best be partial and slanted.
It's not about you or me - its about how well the SNP government is doing at rolling out vaccines.
Well go then regale us on how well England is doing on deaths then. You only select certain items that are bad for Scotland , you ignore all the good data and do the converse for England. Trying to make out that your odd choice is the only topic to be considered is a pathetic attempt at hiding your hatred for Scotland. I will never see you ever post anything positive about Scotland. It is all about you and your bitter twisted hatred of Scotland, not good for your health all that bile and bitterness.
England excess deaths for 2020 are 14% higher than normal, Scotland 11% above normal. Not a huge difference when you consider rural / urban variations and London as a global superspreader. No real evidence that Sturgeon was any more competent than Johnson. I suspect Northern Ireland will have the lowest excess deaths figure for last year.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
The interesting thing about this is the writer is still obviously attached to the arguments that he found persuasive in 2014 (and that are still the main corroded ammo in the current lot's locker) but he realises that they've been made valueless by Brexit and the kakocracy overseeing it. Still, I'm sure a few streets named after VC winners and reclaiming the idea that the UK was an imperialist enterprise from the wokies should get him back onside.
Oh, and which of us didn't predict exactly this - weeks back?
The EU seem to only just be waking up to the fact there are two communities in Northern Ireland to worry about.
I don't recall the EU placing an intra-UK border down the Irish Sea. They had a proposal to get around the whole issue which was rejected massively and repeatedly by the 2017 parliament.
Because the 2017 solution was even worse. The NI Protocol subjugating NI to rules they don't vote for is bad and the solution is to find a way out of that mess for NI.
Instead the 2017 solution was to apply the bad protocol for NI to the entire UK simultaneously. That's worse.
That's like saying the solution for one person being sick is to make everyone sick.
GB is out of the Protocol now, good, so now we need to find a way to extract NI out of it too.
And how do we do that? We're back to either invent the world's first digital customs border, or the GFA collapses and potentially the peace. The Intra-Irish border was always the unsquareable circle. If UK was to diverge from the EU and the Irish border must remain open, then NI could no longer be a full part of the UK.
Easy.
If those are the choices then the option is obvious: We invent the world's first digital customs border.
Because the alternative: The GFA collapses and potentially the peace is worse.
That should have been the obvious solution all along, but regrettably years were wasted with the idea of keeping the UK in the EU's customs border. Thankfully that idea was killed before birth. So now we have the Protocol, which reality is showing isn't viable.
The pressure now is where it always should have been. Ireland isn't going to join the UK, the UK isn't going to join the UK, we want peace - Once you've eliminated the impossible the only option left, however improbable, is the solution. A digital system is all that is left.
Trusted traders, self-declarations and a mutual recognition of SPS rather than demanding SPS checks be done. Do that etc and its job done.
You do know that an digital border is an impossible dream created by people like Redwood who haven't got a clue where the issues / complexities begin let alone how big those complexities are.
They have completely lost their marbles. Got to be Brexit Derangement Syndrome.
Even if she is right that we rushed it and risked safety (which she is most certainly not), then the fact that 9million and counting UK citizens have had the jab without anyone falling over dead is as a pretty good clue that the two in question are safe enough in the circumstances.
How many does she want in a clinical trial? 20million?
To be strictly factual - the safety trials, which were long before the efficacy trials, proved that the various vaccines wouldn't kill or maim people.
This is why it was moral and ethical to embark on the mass efficacy trials. Which were signed off by the various regulators, round the world, on the basis of the results of the safety trials.
this difference between safety and efficacy seems to be totally missed in a lot of discussion - I got into quite a heated discussion with my brother in law who just followed Danish reporting about 'risky' decision being taken by the British that Denmark wouldn't copy - our chief virologist was coming out with all sorts of nonsense about the 'rushed and inadequate process' and that Denmark would not risk offering 'unsafe vaccines' - utter nonsense
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
Just to confirm I am very much in the Global Britain cohort and credit Liz Truss for her successes and her formal application yesterday to join TPP
Can you spot the deliberate mistake with the grouping Liz is trying to join
'It is a trade agreement between 11 Pacific Rim nations: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam'.
Liz Truss should get together with Gavin Williamson. They can form a new MENSA group in the Tory Party
Your last sentence is disgusting
Using mental health to make an argument is so low but then why am I surprised
And when the US joins TPP this group of countries will see a huge increase in tariff free trade
G , your appetite for chlorinated chicken and hormone full beef surprises me?
As you are so good at numbers , could you oblige with the death rates and positivity rates for same countries , we can then do a real comparison of who is doing well rather than your Tory cult ideas of success.
Deflect, blame, ignore.
You don't want the Scottish government to improve its rate of vaccination?
I want them to improve of course, but yet again you highlight your bias with your selective numbers. I am happy that Scotland has lower death rate , lower positivity rate and lower vaccination rate. I look at the big picture , you on the other hand ignore the devastating other numbers and focus on the one good part. When we are all vaccinated , Scotland a week or so behind England but England still having 40% higher death rate and probably world champions, will you still be crowing.
Sounds like you are the one crowing about deaths in England. Unless you've got a time machine you can't change the past - all we can change is the present and the future - but you and the SNP seem very defensive over Scotland's slower vaccination rate, now the "care homes first" rationale has run out of road.
Trying to avoid the point yet again. Post the numbers or prove that you are a ne'er do well. I know for a fact you will not post the real data, cowards like you just hide in the shadows and post misinformation. Not very pleasant.
I'm sure you can google like anyone else - I'm not your data service. Yes, the death numbers in England are worse - for many reasons, some of which will be government (in)action, others will not.
The point is "where we are today" and "what we could do better". Which you don't want to engage with. Lets hope the new "super centres" in Aberdeen & Edinburgh pick up the pace, but there's a lot of pace to pick up.
Yes you only want to discuss selected data , we know you of old. I prefer to look at all the data and do not pick the small part that is good for my point. For sure I am certain you will never post anything positive about Scotland. I will continue to view your data in with that in mind, knowing it will at best be partial and slanted.
It's not about you or me - its about how well the SNP government is doing at rolling out vaccines.
Well go then regale us on how well England is doing on deaths then. You only select certain items that are bad for Scotland , you ignore all the good data and do the converse for England. Trying to make out that your odd choice is the only topic to be considered is a pathetic attempt at hiding your hatred for Scotland. I will never see you ever post anything positive about Scotland. It is all about you and your bitter twisted hatred of Scotland, not good for your health all that bile and bitterness.
England excess deaths for 2020 are 14% higher than normal, Scotland 11% above normal. Not a huge difference when you consider rural / urban variations and London as a global superspreader. No real evidence that Sturgeon was any more competent than Johnson. I suspect Northern Ireland will have the lowest excess deaths figure for last year.
Big differences in the current wave, though - at least for infections etc. See the graph posted earlier. Which may or may not be politically significant.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
Just because something seems obvious doesn't mean it's been done.
This makes intuitive sense - if you've already had Covid, a single vaccine shot seems to act as a booster vaccine shot would otherwise.
Had Covid? You May Need Only One Dose of Vaccine, Study Suggests https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/01/health/have-you-had-covid-19-coronavirus.html ...“I think one vaccination should be sufficient,” said Florian Krammer, a virologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and an author on the study. “This would also spare individuals from unnecessary pain when getting the second dose and it would free up additional vaccine doses.”...
...other immunologists suggest everyone stick to two doses. “I’m a big proponent of the right dosing and right schedule, because that’s how the studies were performed,” said Maria Elena Bottazzi, an immunologist at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston...
That's useful, but probably quote bureaucratic to figure out.
What did you make of the idea to adjust AZ second doses to the SA and Brazil variants rather than doing two complete new doses?
It could be a huge advantage wrt our 12 week policy.
The interesting thing about this is the writer is still obviously attached to the arguments that he found persuasive in 2014 (and that are still the main corroded ammo in the current lot's locker) but he realises that they've been made valueless by Brexit and the kakocracy overseeing it. Still, I'm sure a few streets named after VC winners and reclaiming the idea that the UK was an imperialist enterprise from the wokies should get him back onside.
"But there are audible strains in Tory constitutional politics, too. Just as the leading edge of Brexit nationalism is increasingly hostile to the unionist project of devolution, Conservatives show growing impatience with Best of Both Worlds thinking. The fact things work differently and unevenly across the “four nations” was meant to be the happy point of devolution, though now it is increasingly seen as an insult to British unity and largesse.
This tetchiness is even voiced by the self-styled “Minister for the Union”. Only weeks after privately condemning devolution as a “disaster”, the Prime Minister was reported to claim “that there would not have been a single Covid-19 vaccine in Scotland if it were up to Nicola Sturgeon’s party”. His meaning, a surrogate explained, was that size matters: “the UK is a major country, we’ve got sufficient clout to get the vaccines rolled out”. A fair point, but it remains notable that Johnson’s disdain for the SNP is seldom expressed in a unionist vocabulary, even when finessed and glossed by more tactful communicators. Indeed, it’s difficult to name a leading UK politician who gives the impression of viewing Scotland’s democracy as a cherished part of the British constitutional order, rather than a tiresome subfolder of the “major” state-nation."
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
Just to confirm I am very much in the Global Britain cohort and credit Liz Truss for her successes and her formal application yesterday to join TPP
Can you spot the deliberate mistake with the grouping Liz is trying to join
'It is a trade agreement between 11 Pacific Rim nations: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam'.
Liz Truss should get together with Gavin Williamson. They can form a new MENSA group in the Tory Party
Your last sentence is disgusting
Using mental health to make an argument is so low but then why am I surprised
And when the US joins TPP this group of countries will see a huge increase in tariff free trade
G , your appetite for chlorinated chicken and hormone full beef surprises me?
As you are so good at numbers , could you oblige with the death rates and positivity rates for same countries , we can then do a real comparison of who is doing well rather than your Tory cult ideas of success.
Deflect, blame, ignore.
You don't want the Scottish government to improve its rate of vaccination?
I want them to improve of course, but yet again you highlight your bias with your selective numbers. I am happy that Scotland has lower death rate , lower positivity rate and lower vaccination rate. I look at the big picture , you on the other hand ignore the devastating other numbers and focus on the one good part. When we are all vaccinated , Scotland a week or so behind England but England still having 40% higher death rate and probably world champions, will you still be crowing.
Sounds like you are the one crowing about deaths in England. Unless you've got a time machine you can't change the past - all we can change is the present and the future - but you and the SNP seem very defensive over Scotland's slower vaccination rate, now the "care homes first" rationale has run out of road.
Trying to avoid the point yet again. Post the numbers or prove that you are a ne'er do well. I know for a fact you will not post the real data, cowards like you just hide in the shadows and post misinformation. Not very pleasant.
I'm sure you can google like anyone else - I'm not your data service. Yes, the death numbers in England are worse - for many reasons, some of which will be government (in)action, others will not.
The point is "where we are today" and "what we could do better". Which you don't want to engage with. Lets hope the new "super centres" in Aberdeen & Edinburgh pick up the pace, but there's a lot of pace to pick up.
Yes you only want to discuss selected data , we know you of old. I prefer to look at all the data and do not pick the small part that is good for my point. For sure I am certain you will never post anything positive about Scotland. I will continue to view your data in with that in mind, knowing it will at best be partial and slanted.
It's not about you or me - its about how well the SNP government is doing at rolling out vaccines.
Well go then regale us on how well England is doing on deaths then. You only select certain items that are bad for Scotland , you ignore all the good data and do the converse for England. Trying to make out that your odd choice is the only topic to be considered is a pathetic attempt at hiding your hatred for Scotland. I will never see you ever post anything positive about Scotland. It is all about you and your bitter twisted hatred of Scotland, not good for your health all that bile and bitterness.
England excess deaths for 2020 are 14% higher than normal, Scotland 11% above normal. Not a huge difference when you consider rural / urban variations and London as a global superspreader. No real evidence that Sturgeon was any more competent than Johnson. I suspect Northern Ireland will have the lowest excess deaths figure for last year.
Big differences in the current wave, though - at least for infections etc. See the graph posted earlier. Which may or may not be politically significant.
Yes, first wave was seeded by people returning from Spain / Italy holidays. Second wave by the evolution of a more infectious strain in Kent. Geography rather than any particular administrative skill.
We are not there yet but if (i) vaccines are in limited supply and (ii) the UK has vaccinated sufficiently to control the virus and substantially reopen, it not IMMORAL (in fact it is quite the contrary) to argue that the priority should then be in countries where the virus is raging.
Furthermore this is the most rational approach for a global pandemic. It must be defeated globally otherwise it will be back to bite us with vicious imported mutations and we will be stuck in this twilight world for years.
The header is great but is playing to the gallery.
As Cyclefree and others have said, it would be 100% immoral.
The UK vaccines are owned collectively by the UK population, who as both citizens and taxpayers have paid for and are entitled to receive their share. To take away that share from the younger half without their consent - as both you and the WHO have proposed - is to perpetrate a theft upon them, plain and simple. And not just the usual socialist theft of income or assets - which is bad enough, but which after all is only money - but a theft of their freedom, their physical and mental health, their ability to breathe easily and live normal lives.
That the proponents of such a theft include those who would receive their doses themselves before merrily giving away those of others is more than immoral - it's sick. I don't see any of them volunteering to have their doses sent overseas right now to protect the elderly in poor countries with no healthcare system at all, which is what they would be arguing for if they wished to accept the logical consequences of their lofty 'moral' stance rather than have the young pay the price for their ideals.
Some people are arguing not for us to send them to poor countries but to the EU......
Who wouldn't want them anyway because they might be unsafe, but best they steal them from us in any event.... for some reason.
Perhaps the UK is doing the world a favour.
Since Professors Macron and von der Leyen have declared the vaccines dangerous... by not distributing them to the other countries, we are actually protecting them.
Add to that that some estimate that over 50% of people in Folkestone & Hythe District in Kent have had Covid the herd immunity debate suddenly looks a different. I said earlier that I wondered if the fact that both SA and the UK had variants that ripped through their respective populations resulting in the sort of herd immunity that Sky reported on in SA. It was this piece from the local rag here in Kent that put me on that line of thinking in the UK -
Oh, and which of us didn't predict exactly this - weeks back?
The EU seem to only just be waking up to the fact there are two communities in Northern Ireland to worry about.
I don't recall the EU placing an intra-UK border down the Irish Sea. They had a proposal to get around the whole issue which was rejected massively and repeatedly by the 2017 parliament.
Because the 2017 solution was even worse. The NI Protocol subjugating NI to rules they don't vote for is bad and the solution is to find a way out of that mess for NI.
Instead the 2017 solution was to apply the bad protocol for NI to the entire UK simultaneously. That's worse.
That's like saying the solution for one person being sick is to make everyone sick.
GB is out of the Protocol now, good, so now we need to find a way to extract NI out of it too.
And how do we do that? We're back to either invent the world's first digital customs border, or the GFA collapses and potentially the peace. The Intra-Irish border was always the unsquareable circle. If UK was to diverge from the EU and the Irish border must remain open, then NI could no longer be a full part of the UK.
Easy.
If those are the choices then the option is obvious: We invent the world's first digital customs border.
Because the alternative: The GFA collapses and potentially the peace is worse.
That should have been the obvious solution all along, but regrettably years were wasted with the idea of keeping the UK in the EU's customs border. Thankfully that idea was killed before birth. So now we have the Protocol, which reality is showing isn't viable.
The pressure now is where it always should have been. Ireland isn't going to join the UK, the UK isn't going to join the UK, we want peace - Once you've eliminated the impossible the only option left, however improbable, is the solution. A digital system is all that is left.
Trusted traders, self-declarations and a mutual recognition of SPS rather than demanding SPS checks be done. Do that etc and its job done.
You do know that an digital border is an impossible dream created by people like Redwood who haven't got a clue where the issues / complexities begin let alone how big those complexities are.
Its about as impossible as working from home was impossible. Necessity is the mother of invention.
There were only ever 4 viable solutions.
The UK doesn't leave the EU afterall.
The UK and EU find a workable solution.
Violence.
Turn a blind eye and allow trade to flow without the checks and without impediment.
The EU and their fans like your good self thought that by denying (2) and leaving (3) as horrific would force us down the route of (1), since apparently (4) was also unthinkable. Thankfully that's been put paid to now, the UK is out.
So now it is (2), (3) or (4) that are the only options left. So either you choose violence - or you do whatever it takes to prevent it. Whatever it takes will either mean no solution whatsoever and there's no checks and the market has a big gaping hole to enter, or it will entail a digital solution.
The EU seemed to be under a misapprehension the only violent people to worry about in NI were the Nationalists. Them telling their people not to go to work today reveals otherwise. A viable alternative solution has to be found - and that is going to be bloody close to what Redwood etc were always suggesting. It doesn't matter how complex they are, a way needs to be found to get through those complexities if you want peace - peace is complex. NI is complex.
They have completely lost their marbles. Got to be Brexit Derangement Syndrome.
Even if she is right that we rushed it and risked safety (which she is most certainly not), then the fact that 9million and counting UK citizens have had the jab without anyone falling over dead is as a pretty good clue that the two in question are safe enough in the circumstances.
How many does she want in a clinical trial? 20million?
I broadly agree with the sentiment, but there are almost certainly a non-trivial number of people among the 9 million who will have fallen dead shortly after receiving the jab. That's just statistical reality, noting the sheer numbers and the fact many were very elderly.
No doubt that will be looked at to see if any of that is due to adverse reaction to the vaccine, and it wouldn't be shocking if an adverse reaction contributed to the deaths of a small number of people (while saving many more). So you can say that real roll-out adds to the evidence that the vaccine is sufficiently safe, but can't really say 9 million have had the jab "without anyone falling over dead", as that's almost certainly wrong.
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
Thankfully you are not in charge of vaccine disposition
I'll be writing to my MP though. And possibly to the papers too.
Good for you, seeking to influence things politically.
The MP will also probably appreciate a letter which isn't a whinge or abuse.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
Nowhere in the world seems to be doing population sampling for antigen, some are doing it for antibodies.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
Fair enough but French deaths also never got above 1000 in January. Maybe they count those differently?
Given how fucked their take on vaccines has been, it does make you wonder - just how fucked was their Brexit strategic thinking? Did they REALLY think we would give up on Brexit if they were big enough twats? Cuz that seems to be their way of approaching Covid.
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
Thankfully you are not in charge of vaccine disposition
I'll be writing to my MP though. And possibly to the papers too.
Wonderful - if you can get Labour to adopt your policy, the Tories will win every age group from 18 upwards for the foreseeable future.
Given how fucked their take on vaccines has been, it does make you wonder - just how fucked was their Brexit strategic thinking? Did they REALLY think we would give up on Brexit if they were big enough twats? Cuz that seems to be their way of approaching Covid.
Yes and they clearly going to continue to take that approach. The only problem for the UK is it is a trickier prospect then sorting out vaccine supplies.
Yes, first wave was seeded by people returning from Spain / Italy holidays. Second wave by the evolution of a more infectious strain in Kent. Geography rather than any particular administrative skill.
Making it clear in November that there would be a return to near lockdown for most of Scotland rather than burbling about saving Christmas wasn't just a happy accident.
Good thing the Oxford team is already working on updating the current vaccine to beat that mutation in time for second doses. Our 12 week gap policy could be a huge stroke of luck as people won't need a third jab to protect themselves against it.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
Fair enough but French deaths also never got above 1000 in January. Maybe they count those differently?
It's certainly possible to count deaths differently. Even if you both use the "death within a month of COVID diagnosis" measure then lower testing (albeit you'd be more likely to test a very serious case) does likely mean fewer deaths on that measure.
I think you're probably right Britain has done worse than many neighbours on control of cases and deaths, and Malmesbury is being over-optimistic. But it can also be true that the published stats need to be treated with care and may not be directly comparable.
Good thing the Oxford team is already working on updating the current vaccine to beat that mutation in time for second doses. Our 12 week gap policy could be a huge stroke of luck as people won't need a third jab to protect themselves against it.
That will be the EU spin....our cautious roll out allowed us to give full protection against the new variants...
Won't the Oxford AZN updated vaccine have to go through trials again?
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
Fair enough but French deaths also never got above 1000 in January. Maybe they count those differently?
You have January's excess death figures for France? Because those haven't been published yet as far as I know.
3 January France's excess death rate was 11% and their known Covid deaths and cases have risen since then.
France's case figures keep gradually rising, not exponentially but they're under a very strict curfew - the restrictions in France have been much greater than what they are here. You can't even leave your house in France without informing the Government that you are first and why. On current trends France will overtake the UK in cases per capita this week as we're still trending down and they're still trending up despite their extremely strict curfew.
We are not there yet but if (i) vaccines are in limited supply and (ii) the UK has vaccinated sufficiently to control the virus and substantially reopen, it not IMMORAL (in fact it is quite the contrary) to argue that the priority should then be in countries where the virus is raging.
Furthermore this is the most rational approach for a global pandemic. It must be defeated globally otherwise it will be back to bite us with vicious imported mutations and we will be stuck in this twilight world for years.
The header is great but is playing to the gallery.
As Cyclefree and others have said, it would be 100% immoral.
The UK vaccines are owned collectively by the UK population, who as both citizens and taxpayers have paid for and are entitled to receive their share. To take away that share from the younger half without their consent - as both you and the WHO have proposed - is to perpetrate a theft upon them, plain and simple. And not just the usual socialist theft of income or assets - which is bad enough, but which after all is only money - but a theft of their freedom, their physical and mental health, their ability to breathe easily and live normal lives.
That the proponents of such a theft include those who would receive their doses themselves before merrily giving away those of others is more than immoral - it's sick. I don't see any of them volunteering to have their doses sent overseas right now to protect the elderly in poor countries with no healthcare system at all, which is what they would be arguing for if they wished to accept the logical consequences of their lofty 'moral' stance rather than have the young pay the price for their ideals.
Yes, the spectacle of those from priority groups advocating marginalising the young is somewhat unedifying, to put it mildly.
Good thing the Oxford team is already working on updating the current vaccine to beat that mutation in time for second doses. Our 12 week gap policy could be a huge stroke of luck as people won't need a third jab to protect themselves against it.
That will be the EU spin....our cautious roll out allowed us to give full protection against the new variants...
Won't the Oxford AZN updated vaccine have to go through trials again?
By the time they get around to approving it they'll have to start from scratch anyway.
The interesting thing about this is the writer is still obviously attached to the arguments that he found persuasive in 2014 (and that are still the main corroded ammo in the current lot's locker) but he realises that they've been made valueless by Brexit and the kakocracy overseeing it. Still, I'm sure a few streets named after VC winners and reclaiming the idea that the UK was an imperialist enterprise from the wokies should get him back onside.
Yes, the key paragraphs on the end: "In short, the Prime Minister is in a terrible bind. Brexit has spiked his own best arguments. The Scots intensely dislike him, so he is damned if he ventures north and damned if he doesn’t. And in the wake of Brexit they are unlikely to be bought off with yet more financial bungs or constitutional fixes.
Sad to say, the Prime Minister’s best hope of saving the Union is that the SNP’s warring factions, the Salmondites and Sturgeonistas, tear themselves apart."
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
I don't think we need 'everyone done' first either - that's a waste of time that would leave doses stockpiled. But we do need a full vaccination -secured- for every person in the UK. Once that's locked in, let's have at Covid worldwide.
Sorry, don't follow. What's the difference between "everyone done" and "full vaccination secured for every person"?
Either enough vaccines in stock for everyone, or as guaranteed to be imminently - in the UK system.
Good thing the Oxford team is already working on updating the current vaccine to beat that mutation in time for second doses. Our 12 week gap policy could be a huge stroke of luck as people won't need a third jab to protect themselves against it.
Would a modification to the vaccine not require new trials?
The interesting thing about this is the writer is still obviously attached to the arguments that he found persuasive in 2014 (and that are still the main corroded ammo in the current lot's locker) but he realises that they've been made valueless by Brexit and the kakocracy overseeing it. Still, I'm sure a few streets named after VC winners and reclaiming the idea that the UK was an imperialist enterprise from the wokies should get him back onside.
Good thing the Oxford team is already working on updating the current vaccine to beat that mutation in time for second doses. Our 12 week gap policy could be a huge stroke of luck as people won't need a third jab to protect themselves against it.
That will be the EU spin....our cautious roll out allowed us to give full protection against the new variants...
Won't the Oxford AZN updated vaccine have to go through trials again?
By the time they get around to approving it they'll have to start from scratch anyway.
I am not sure about the idea those getting 2nd dose in 12 weeks will get an updated version. Haven't AZN already made 23 million doses that we know of (and still producing more), so they will need to be used up first.
Some people are due their 2nd dose in 8 weeks now.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
One thing that isn't widely appreciated is the extent to which the UK is a leader in epidemiology, largely due to having good data due to the NHS being so integrated. As someone who goes (well, used to go when such things were possible) to a number of epidemiology conferences, you come to appreciate how dominated the area is by a few countries - UK, Canada (some parts e.g. BC), the Nordic countries, Australia (some states, e.g. NSW) and some in Asia (S Korea, for example) where there are good data. US also, to some extent - their data are a mess, but you can do reasonable studies using the data from just a single big insurer, albeit with a not representative of general population sample.
You get the occasional team from Germany or France, but they've generally had to work a hell of a lot harder gathering data from specific local providers. It's just hard to do.
Edit: The kind of mass testing for infection levels done here could of course have been done anywhere, but first you have to have the research capacity to design and run such an experiment.
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
Thankfully you are not in charge of vaccine disposition
I'll be writing to my MP though. And possibly to the papers too.
Wonderful - if you can get Labour to adopt your policy, the Tories will win every age group from 18 upwards for the foreseeable future.
Cases are dropping in most places, it seems, independent of their lockdown approach.
Fancy.
South Africa are under a strict lockdown, stricter than here. Can't even legally buy alcohol in South Africa unless they've changed it recently.
"It's a real scientific mystery," said Dr Mutevedzi. "I think it's a real possible scientific theory that [because] these crowded areas have always been prone to disease and had high infection rates so maybe that has somehow prevented them from having severe Covid-19 or from actually being infected with Covid."
She played down the impact of government restrictions, saying that, in practice, there had been "no lockdown" in much of Soweto since people had often struggled to adhere to the rules.
One of the things I find most amazing of the long list of amazingly stupid things the EU is doing in this whole vaccine business is that they don't even seem to be thinking a few weeks ahead on the politics. I get why they might want to blame AZ/the Brits/the MHRA etc as a cheap political point to distract attention from their own failings, but how the hell do they expect that to continue working as the UK continues to roll out and the effect of the vaccines on the death and hospitalisation figures begins to come through? They are going to look damned silly when it turns out that what they characterise as the our 'risky' approach was much more prudent than theirs.
Looking at the figures, France covid cases have never been above 30,000 since the new year and their children are in school full time.
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
The level of testing is much lower in France. You can't directly compare the numbers like that.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
Fair enough but French deaths also never got above 1000 in January. Maybe they count those differently?
It's certainly possible to count deaths differently. Even if you both use the "death within a month of COVID diagnosis" measure then lower testing (albeit you'd be more likely to test a very serious case) does likely mean fewer deaths on that measure.
I think you're probably right Britain has done worse than many neighbours on control of cases and deaths, and Malmesbury is being over-optimistic. But it can also be true that the published stats need to be treated with care and may not be directly comparable.
I'm not optimistic about anything to do with COVID - apart from the marked success in clinical trials of a great number of vaccines.
Using raw testing numbers from various countries simply doesn't work. The only way to do any kind of comparison is excess deaths - that, or a vast academic project to try and build a database of reconcilable numbers.
That's useful, but probably quote bureaucratic to figure out.
What did you make of the idea to adjust AZ second doses to the SA and Brazil variants rather than doing two complete new doses?
It could be a huge advantage wrt our 12 week policy.
Mixing and matching makes a lot of sense.
I think we're already trying that with the existing Pfizer/AZN shots (there was a report of a planned study starting in Jan), and animal studies suggests doing this produces the best immune response of all the vaccines.
A booster with a modified spike protein to match mutations on the more worrying variants ought to be an effective booster given everything we've seen so far.
Given how fucked their take on vaccines has been, it does make you wonder - just how fucked was their Brexit strategic thinking? Did they REALLY think we would give up on Brexit if they were big enough twats? Cuz that seems to be their way of approaching Covid.
It explains a lot.
Facilitated of course by many here in this country who wanted that too.
I highly doubt the NI Protocol will be renewed as-is in four years time when it is scheduled to (or whenever the first renewal is due), it may not even last that long. The solution for NI was always going to be to square the circle by putting it in everyone's interests to facilitate that. Now the EU are waking up to the fact the Unionist Community exists in NI and suddenly they're realising what that actually means.
If that results in logical compromises to fix the NI border that can be used for the greater UK/EU border too - mutual recognition on SPS etc - then so much the better.
Oh, and which of us didn't predict exactly this - weeks back?
The EU seem to only just be waking up to the fact there are two communities in Northern Ireland to worry about.
I don't recall the EU placing an intra-UK border down the Irish Sea. They had a proposal to get around the whole issue which was rejected massively and repeatedly by the 2017 parliament.
Because the 2017 solution was even worse. The NI Protocol subjugating NI to rules they don't vote for is bad and the solution is to find a way out of that mess for NI.
Instead the 2017 solution was to apply the bad protocol for NI to the entire UK simultaneously. That's worse.
That's like saying the solution for one person being sick is to make everyone sick.
GB is out of the Protocol now, good, so now we need to find a way to extract NI out of it too.
And how do we do that? We're back to either invent the world's first digital customs border, or the GFA collapses and potentially the peace. The Intra-Irish border was always the unsquareable circle. If UK was to diverge from the EU and the Irish border must remain open, then NI could no longer be a full part of the UK.
Easy.
If those are the choices then the option is obvious: We invent the world's first digital customs border.
Because the alternative: The GFA collapses and potentially the peace is worse.
That should have been the obvious solution all along, but regrettably years were wasted with the idea of keeping the UK in the EU's customs border. Thankfully that idea was killed before birth. So now we have the Protocol, which reality is showing isn't viable.
The pressure now is where it always should have been. Ireland isn't going to join the UK, the UK isn't going to join the UK, we want peace - Once you've eliminated the impossible the only option left, however improbable, is the solution. A digital system is all that is left.
Trusted traders, self-declarations and a mutual recognition of SPS rather than demanding SPS checks be done. Do that etc and its job done.
You do know that an digital border is an impossible dream created by people like Redwood who haven't got a clue where the issues / complexities begin let alone how big those complexities are.
Its about as impossible as working from home was impossible. Necessity is the mother of invention.
There were only ever 4 viable solutions.
The UK doesn't leave the EU afterall.
The UK and EU find a workable solution.
Violence.
Turn a blind eye and allow trade to flow without the checks and without impediment.
The EU and their fans like your good self thought that by denying (2) and leaving (3) as horrific would force us down the route of (1), since apparently (4) was also unthinkable. Thankfully that's been put paid to now, the UK is out.
So now it is (2), (3) or (4) that are the only options left. So either you choose violence - or you do whatever it takes to prevent it. Whatever it takes will either mean no solution whatsoever and there's no checks and the market has a big gaping hole to enter, or it will entail a digital solution.
The EU seemed to be under a misapprehension the only violent people to worry about in NI were the Nationalists. Them telling their people not to go to work today reveals otherwise. A viable alternative solution has to be found - and that is going to be bloody close to what Redwood etc were always suggesting. It doesn't matter how complex they are, a way needs to be found to get through those complexities if you want peace - peace is complex. NI is complex.
It isn't our departure from the EU that is the problem, its our departure from the EEA. Yes, "necessity is the mother of invention". But it is a peculiar piece of English exceptionalism to surmise that the reason this hasn't yet been invented is because we haven't needed it. There are plenty of other borders who would benefit if such a thing existed - presumably then its only the English who can create it because the rest of the world aren't smart enough?
The UK and EU could have found a workable solution. The problem was that we rejected every single one of the options as not being "proper" Brexit. Leaving the European Union is Brexit. What we do afterwards doesn't change that we have left.
The reality of your position Philip and that of so many Conservative and Unionist MPs is that the Union can go hang in exchange for the prize.
Yes, we've done this. Cue yet more hysteria, some PBers can't help themselves.
Addicted to doom.
Quite. Fortunately, as shown by recent weeks, lockdown is still working against these mutants, SA has not gone out of control either, and we have an active vaccination programme that has excellent efficacy against the more Wuhan type virus, and good against the known mutants. In addition, the vaccines are preventing severe disease all everywhere in the trials. This is really all it needs to do. If no-one needs hospital or dies of covid, it doesn't matter how many cases a day there are.
This makes intuitive sense - if you've already had Covid, a single vaccine shot seems to act as a booster vaccine shot would otherwise.
Had Covid? You May Need Only One Dose of Vaccine, Study Suggests https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/01/health/have-you-had-covid-19-coronavirus.html ...“I think one vaccination should be sufficient,” said Florian Krammer, a virologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and an author on the study. “This would also spare individuals from unnecessary pain when getting the second dose and it would free up additional vaccine doses.”...
...other immunologists suggest everyone stick to two doses. “I’m a big proponent of the right dosing and right schedule, because that’s how the studies were performed,” said Maria Elena Bottazzi, an immunologist at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston...
That's useful, but probably quote bureaucratic to figure out.
What did you make of the idea to adjust AZ second doses to the SA and Brazil variants rather than doing two complete new doses?
It could be a huge advantage wrt our 12 week policy.
Is there a potential downside to giving someone who's had the virus a second vaccine dose, other than pain?
I guess opportunity cost, but the expense is marginal, and it's probably quicker to not have to worry about the bureaucracy. Can one have too many COVID antibodies?
Every week of this pandemic costs the UK economy £6bn 0.5% of GDP goes to foreign aid. Therefore every week the pandemic ravashes the UK costs the foreign aid budget £30m
£30m is enough to pay for about 10-15m doses of Astrazeneca vaccine.
So every week the UK isn't fully vaccinated costs overseas the equivalent of 10-15 million vaccine doses? Why would you want to deny that money to the rest of the world?
The developing world is better off if we are fully vaccinated and using our strength at full capacity to vaccinate others. That will save millions of lives globally.
Careful - you're dangerously close to suggesting that cutting the aid budget might lead to lots of people dying.
Cases are dropping in most places, it seems, independent of their lockdown approach.
Fancy.
South Africa are under a strict lockdown, stricter than here. Can't even legally buy alcohol in South Africa unless they've changed it recently.
"It's a real scientific mystery," said Dr Mutevedzi. "I think it's a real possible scientific theory that [because] these crowded areas have always been prone to disease and had high infection rates so maybe that has somehow prevented them from having severe Covid-19 or from actually being infected with Covid."
She played down the impact of government restrictions, saying that, in practice, there had been "no lockdown" in much of Soweto since people had often struggled to adhere to the rules.
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
Just to confirm I am very much in the Global Britain cohort and credit Liz Truss for her successes and her formal application yesterday to join TPP
Can you spot the deliberate mistake with the grouping Liz is trying to join
'It is a trade agreement between 11 Pacific Rim nations: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam'.
Liz Truss should get together with Gavin Williamson. They can form a new MENSA group in the Tory Party
Your last sentence is disgusting
Using mental health to make an argument is so low but then why am I surprised
And when the US joins TPP this group of countries will see a huge increase in tariff free trade
G , your appetite for chlorinated chicken and hormone full beef surprises me?
As you are so good at numbers , could you oblige with the death rates and positivity rates for same countries , we can then do a real comparison of who is doing well rather than your Tory cult ideas of success.
Deflect, blame, ignore.
You don't want the Scottish government to improve its rate of vaccination?
I want them to improve of course, but yet again you highlight your bias with your selective numbers. I am happy that Scotland has lower death rate , lower positivity rate and lower vaccination rate. I look at the big picture , you on the other hand ignore the devastating other numbers and focus on the one good part. When we are all vaccinated , Scotland a week or so behind England but England still having 40% higher death rate and probably world champions, will you still be crowing.
Sounds like you are the one crowing about deaths in England. Unless you've got a time machine you can't change the past - all we can change is the present and the future - but you and the SNP seem very defensive over Scotland's slower vaccination rate, now the "care homes first" rationale has run out of road.
Trying to avoid the point yet again. Post the numbers or prove that you are a ne'er do well. I know for a fact you will not post the real data, cowards like you just hide in the shadows and post misinformation. Not very pleasant.
I'm sure you can google like anyone else - I'm not your data service. Yes, the death numbers in England are worse - for many reasons, some of which will be government (in)action, others will not.
The point is "where we are today" and "what we could do better". Which you don't want to engage with. Lets hope the new "super centres" in Aberdeen & Edinburgh pick up the pace, but there's a lot of pace to pick up.
Yes you only want to discuss selected data , we know you of old. I prefer to look at all the data and do not pick the small part that is good for my point. For sure I am certain you will never post anything positive about Scotland. I will continue to view your data in with that in mind, knowing it will at best be partial and slanted.
It's not about you or me - its about how well the SNP government is doing at rolling out vaccines.
Well go then regale us on how well England is doing on deaths then. You only select certain items that are bad for Scotland , you ignore all the good data and do the converse for England. Trying to make out that your odd choice is the only topic to be considered is a pathetic attempt at hiding your hatred for Scotland. I will never see you ever post anything positive about Scotland. It is all about you and your bitter twisted hatred of Scotland, not good for your health all that bile and bitterness.
England excess deaths for 2020 are 14% higher than normal, Scotland 11% above normal. Not a huge difference when you consider rural / urban variations and London as a global superspreader. No real evidence that Sturgeon was any more competent than Johnson. I suspect Northern Ireland will have the lowest excess deaths figure for last year.
I know that and the vaccinations that Carlotta is trumpeting amount to a hill of beans and will at best mean a week or two of difference. Does not conceal the fact that she is blinded by her hatred of Scotland and would never paint any picture that is not negative. I was merely pointing out that you could use selective data to prove any falsehood. Neither country comes out well and idiots wittering on about how awesome UK is at vaccination are just ignoring the dire state of the UK fight overall. It is not a national sport to be boasting about , most unedifying the gloating that goes on here, especially when you look at overall picture.
Michelle O'Neill on -33% and Michael Martin on -21%.
The highest rating is +63% for Health Minister and former UUP leader Robin Swann, Sturgeon's rating is largely irrelevant as she is Scottish not Northern Irish and not part of either the UK or Irish governments
"Scotland is irrelevant to Northern Island" is the kind of hard hitting, clear headed political analysis I come here for.
On Friday when after Article 16 was revoked and before the European Commission retreated, when it was roundly criticised by the British Government, the Irish Government, the NI First Minister, Tories, Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, Irish parties, DUP, Sinn Fein, SDLP and Alliance . . . did the SNP have anything to say on the matter?
Yes, they did actually.
I think a lot of us missed that - what did they say and also when did they say it?
OK.
Bang to rights - can't find it.
I may have got SNP muddled up with Michael Gove's "Brussels made a mistake" from Saturday.
John Ashworth - The extra testing to combat the South African variant is welcome, he says, but he suggests it should go further because people go “beyond their postcode boundaries”.
The government could test every person in the country every day and Labour would say why aren't we testing people's pets ..
Good thing the Oxford team is already working on updating the current vaccine to beat that mutation in time for second doses. Our 12 week gap policy could be a huge stroke of luck as people won't need a third jab to protect themselves against it.
That will be the EU spin....our cautious roll out allowed us to give full protection against the new variants...
Won't the Oxford AZN updated vaccine have to go through trials again?
Don't think so - I recall variations to fit new variants will be authorised under the existing licence. Hence the mRNA versions are unbelievably easy to tweak.
Oh, and which of us didn't predict exactly this - weeks back?
The EU seem to only just be waking up to the fact there are two communities in Northern Ireland to worry about.
I don't recall the EU placing an intra-UK border down the Irish Sea. They had a proposal to get around the whole issue which was rejected massively and repeatedly by the 2017 parliament.
Because the 2017 solution was even worse. The NI Protocol subjugating NI to rules they don't vote for is bad and the solution is to find a way out of that mess for NI.
Instead the 2017 solution was to apply the bad protocol for NI to the entire UK simultaneously. That's worse.
That's like saying the solution for one person being sick is to make everyone sick.
GB is out of the Protocol now, good, so now we need to find a way to extract NI out of it too.
And how do we do that? We're back to either invent the world's first digital customs border, or the GFA collapses and potentially the peace. The Intra-Irish border was always the unsquareable circle. If UK was to diverge from the EU and the Irish border must remain open, then NI could no longer be a full part of the UK.
Easy.
If those are the choices then the option is obvious: We invent the world's first digital customs border.
Because the alternative: The GFA collapses and potentially the peace is worse.
That should have been the obvious solution all along, but regrettably years were wasted with the idea of keeping the UK in the EU's customs border. Thankfully that idea was killed before birth. So now we have the Protocol, which reality is showing isn't viable.
The pressure now is where it always should have been. Ireland isn't going to join the UK, the UK isn't going to join the UK, we want peace - Once you've eliminated the impossible the only option left, however improbable, is the solution. A digital system is all that is left.
Trusted traders, self-declarations and a mutual recognition of SPS rather than demanding SPS checks be done. Do that etc and its job done.
You do know that an digital border is an impossible dream created by people like Redwood who haven't got a clue where the issues / complexities begin let alone how big those complexities are.
Its about as impossible as working from home was impossible. Necessity is the mother of invention.
There were only ever 4 viable solutions.
The UK doesn't leave the EU afterall.
The UK and EU find a workable solution.
Violence.
Turn a blind eye and allow trade to flow without the checks and without impediment.
The EU and their fans like your good self thought that by denying (2) and leaving (3) as horrific would force us down the route of (1), since apparently (4) was also unthinkable. Thankfully that's been put paid to now, the UK is out.
So now it is (2), (3) or (4) that are the only options left. So either you choose violence - or you do whatever it takes to prevent it. Whatever it takes will either mean no solution whatsoever and there's no checks and the market has a big gaping hole to enter, or it will entail a digital solution.
The EU seemed to be under a misapprehension the only violent people to worry about in NI were the Nationalists. Them telling their people not to go to work today reveals otherwise. A viable alternative solution has to be found - and that is going to be bloody close to what Redwood etc were always suggesting. It doesn't matter how complex they are, a way needs to be found to get through those complexities if you want peace - peace is complex. NI is complex.
It isn't our departure from the EU that is the problem, its our departure from the EEA. Yes, "necessity is the mother of invention". But it is a peculiar piece of English exceptionalism to surmise that the reason this hasn't yet been invented is because we haven't needed it. There are plenty of other borders who would benefit if such a thing existed - presumably then its only the English who can create it because the rest of the world aren't smart enough?
The UK and EU could have found a workable solution. The problem was that we rejected every single one of the options as not being "proper" Brexit. Leaving the European Union is Brexit. What we do afterwards doesn't change that we have left.
The reality of your position Philip and that of so many Conservative and Unionist MPs is that the Union can go hang in exchange for the prize.
You know I'm a nationalist not a unionist don't you?
It doesn't matter whether you dislike us having left the EEA or not anymore. Its done. The egg is broken and there's no putting Humpty Dumpty back together again.
You're approaching the whole thing backwards. You want to determine what the solution is and then choose a form of Brexit to match that. No, we choose a form of Brext (so having got a "proper" Brexit now) and now we need to find the workable solution that works with that.
It doesn't matter if no solution works yet. Invent one. Needs must and all that.
Michelle O'Neill on -33% and Michael Martin on -21%.
The highest rating is +63% for Health Minister and former UUP leader Robin Swann, Sturgeon's rating is largely irrelevant as she is Scottish not Northern Irish and not part of either the UK or Irish governments
"Scotland is irrelevant to Northern Island" is the kind of hard hitting, clear headed political analysis I come here for.
On Friday when after Article 16 was revoked and before the European Commission retreated, when it was roundly criticised by the British Government, the Irish Government, the NI First Minister, Tories, Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats, Irish parties, DUP, Sinn Fein, SDLP and Alliance . . . did the SNP have anything to say on the matter?
Yes, they did actually.
I think a lot of us missed that - what did they say and also when did they say it?
OK.
Bang to rights - can't find it.
I may have got SNP muddled up with Michael Gove's "Brussels made a mistake" from Saturday.
We are not there yet but if (i) vaccines are in limited supply and (ii) the UK has vaccinated sufficiently to control the virus and substantially reopen, it not IMMORAL (in fact it is quite the contrary) to argue that the priority should then be in countries where the virus is raging.
Furthermore this is the most rational approach for a global pandemic. It must be defeated globally otherwise it will be back to bite us with vicious imported mutations and we will be stuck in this twilight world for years.
The header is great but is playing to the gallery.
As Cyclefree and others have said, it would be 100% immoral.
The UK vaccines are owned collectively by the UK population, who as both citizens and taxpayers have paid for and are entitled to receive their share. To take away that share from the younger half without their consent - as both you and the WHO have proposed - is to perpetrate a theft upon them, plain and simple. And not just the usual socialist theft of income or assets - which is bad enough, but which after all is only money - but a theft of their freedom, their physical and mental health, their ability to breathe easily and live normal lives.
That the proponents of such a theft include those who would receive their doses themselves before merrily giving away those of others is more than immoral - it's sick. I don't see any of them volunteering to have their doses sent overseas right now to protect the elderly in poor countries with no healthcare system at all, which is what they would be arguing for if they wished to accept the logical consequences of their lofty 'moral' stance rather than have the young pay the price for their ideals.
Congratulations on embracing the idea of collectivist ownership in a domestic context. I'll look for you to apply this in other parts of our national life.
Otherwise, absolute hogwash.
(i) When we have the virus under control, the priority should be switched to the global effort.
(ii) We should not think about the global effort until we have vaccinated every single person in the UK.
Neither of these positions are immoral. Your perspective depends on your answers to various questions. What is the duty of a government? What is the right balance between national and international goals and obligations? For example, is it immoral to spend on foreign aid while we still have poverty here? What if global poverty were contagious and could be spread by human contact? Would that change things? What is meant by enlightened self-interest? Etc etc.
I've ignored the stupid personalizing stuff at the end. Like I said before, it's on the level of "Donate to HMRC then" as a response to somebody arguing for higher taxes. I just have no time for it.
The interesting thing about this is the writer is still obviously attached to the arguments that he found persuasive in 2014 (and that are still the main corroded ammo in the current lot's locker) but he realises that they've been made valueless by Brexit and the kakocracy overseeing it. Still, I'm sure a few streets named after VC winners and reclaiming the idea that the UK was an imperialist enterprise from the wokies should get him back onside.
Yes, we've done this. Cue yet more hysteria, some PBers can't help themselves.
Addicted to doom.
Are we though? In under a year, we have developed multiple, effective, safe vaccines. We have the ability to (very rapidly in some cases) adjust these if needed to combat mutations. We have built the capacity to produce and deliver these vaccines at scale. Barring something completely unforeseen, we've not only got this beat, but we've put in the groundwork to better protect ourselves from the next nasty, whether it arrives in one year or a hundred (assuming we don't get complacent and forget what we have learned).
There have been many mistakes, but Covid is going to go down in history as an amazing story of human endeavour, the first time we've been able to move so quickly to overcome a serious new disease without letting it wipe out large parts of the population (I know the death toll has been bad, but nothing compared to those seen historically and nothing compared to the deaths we would have seen if we'd not done anything).
Oh, and which of us didn't predict exactly this - weeks back?
The EU seem to only just be waking up to the fact there are two communities in Northern Ireland to worry about.
I don't recall the EU placing an intra-UK border down the Irish Sea. They had a proposal to get around the whole issue which was rejected massively and repeatedly by the 2017 parliament.
Because the 2017 solution was even worse. The NI Protocol subjugating NI to rules they don't vote for is bad and the solution is to find a way out of that mess for NI.
Instead the 2017 solution was to apply the bad protocol for NI to the entire UK simultaneously. That's worse.
That's like saying the solution for one person being sick is to make everyone sick.
GB is out of the Protocol now, good, so now we need to find a way to extract NI out of it too.
And how do we do that? We're back to either invent the world's first digital customs border, or the GFA collapses and potentially the peace. The Intra-Irish border was always the unsquareable circle. If UK was to diverge from the EU and the Irish border must remain open, then NI could no longer be a full part of the UK.
Easy.
If those are the choices then the option is obvious: We invent the world's first digital customs border.
Because the alternative: The GFA collapses and potentially the peace is worse.
That should have been the obvious solution all along, but regrettably years were wasted with the idea of keeping the UK in the EU's customs border. Thankfully that idea was killed before birth. So now we have the Protocol, which reality is showing isn't viable.
The pressure now is where it always should have been. Ireland isn't going to join the UK, the UK isn't going to join the UK, we want peace - Once you've eliminated the impossible the only option left, however improbable, is the solution. A digital system is all that is left.
Trusted traders, self-declarations and a mutual recognition of SPS rather than demanding SPS checks be done. Do that etc and its job done.
You do know that an digital border is an impossible dream created by people like Redwood who haven't got a clue where the issues / complexities begin let alone how big those complexities are.
Its about as impossible as working from home was impossible. Necessity is the mother of invention.
There were only ever 4 viable solutions.
The UK doesn't leave the EU afterall.
The UK and EU find a workable solution.
Violence.
Turn a blind eye and allow trade to flow without the checks and without impediment.
The EU and their fans like your good self thought that by denying (2) and leaving (3) as horrific would force us down the route of (1), since apparently (4) was also unthinkable. Thankfully that's been put paid to now, the UK is out.
So now it is (2), (3) or (4) that are the only options left. So either you choose violence - or you do whatever it takes to prevent it. Whatever it takes will either mean no solution whatsoever and there's no checks and the market has a big gaping hole to enter, or it will entail a digital solution.
The EU seemed to be under a misapprehension the only violent people to worry about in NI were the Nationalists. Them telling their people not to go to work today reveals otherwise. A viable alternative solution has to be found - and that is going to be bloody close to what Redwood etc were always suggesting. It doesn't matter how complex they are, a way needs to be found to get through those complexities if you want peace - peace is complex. NI is complex.
Indeed, the GFA ensured peace in NI via powersharing via the NI Assembly and an open border between NI and Ireland and NI and GB.
The EU decided a UK trade deal could only be agreed with a border between NI and GB and it should not be surprised if extremist Unionists and offshoots of the old loyalist paramilitaries now start to threaten border officials at the NI and GB border unfortunately
In good time we should be generous with out vaccines (especially with Ireland poorer nations) but only when we've vaccinated enough of our own people to significantly drive down the infection rate and ease the pressure on the NHS.
By about May we should be in a position to start sharing our vaccines hopefully.
This is what I'm saying. The alternative vision - no diversion until we have done everyone and have full domestic normality with near zero covid here and our borders closed to the world - does not appeal to me.
I don't think we need 'everyone done' first either - that's a waste of time that would leave doses stockpiled. But we do need a full vaccination -secured- for every person in the UK. Once that's locked in, let's have at Covid worldwide.
Sorry, don't follow. What's the difference between "everyone done" and "full vaccination secured for every person"?
Either enough vaccines in stock for everyone, or as guaranteed to be imminently - in the UK system.
Yes , lots of weaselly words can be used. I listened to union Jack at the weekend and he started off saying Scotland had 1 million available and not used lots, he was then asked clearly if he was stating that there were 1 million in Scotland for use and he started back pedalling and said there were 1 million available for use and as we know he meant in warehouses down south. Easy for these lying toerags to use weaselly words and half truths to paint whatever picture they want fools to believe.
Given how fucked their take on vaccines has been, it does make you wonder - just how fucked was their Brexit strategic thinking? Did they REALLY think we would give up on Brexit if they were big enough twats? Cuz that seems to be their way of approaching Covid.
That would be - channelling Mr Hugh - Fuckity-fuckity-fucked.
John Ashworth - The extra testing to combat the South African variant is welcome, he says, but he suggests it should go further because people go “beyond their postcode boundaries”.
The government could test every person in the country every day and Labour would say why aren't we testing people's pets ..
People are cottoning on to their rampant and incoherent opportunism though and that's why they are not making headway against Johnson.
It strikes me that there are two different, and not easily reconcilable, ideologies at the heart of this government (and on PB): Global Britain, and Britain First. These ideologies are being played out in the vaccination debate, on post-Brexit Britain, on Scottish nationalism (England First, rather than Britain First), and elsewhere in government.
So Global Britain is the outward-looking, vaccine sharing, Liz Truss trade vision, Hong Kong migrants welcoming type of vision that I suspect the PM favours.
Britain First is the vaccine hoarding, EU-hating, migrant Channel-crossing anxious, sod off Scotland, nationalistic vision of much of the Tory Party membership and beloved by most of the tabloids.
While both visions are represented by PB Tories, being the civilised bunch they are most favour Global Britain.
I suspect the government will struggle to hold this coalition together as time goes on, and it gives opposition parties an opportunity to (to coin a phrase) develop a third way that mediates between, and away from, these stark choices.
Just to confirm I am very much in the Global Britain cohort and credit Liz Truss for her successes and her formal application yesterday to join TPP
Can you spot the deliberate mistake with the grouping Liz is trying to join
'It is a trade agreement between 11 Pacific Rim nations: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore and Vietnam'.
Liz Truss should get together with Gavin Williamson. They can form a new MENSA group in the Tory Party
Your last sentence is disgusting
Using mental health to make an argument is so low but then why am I surprised
And when the US joins TPP this group of countries will see a huge increase in tariff free trade
G , your appetite for chlorinated chicken and hormone full beef surprises me?
As you are so good at numbers , could you oblige with the death rates and positivity rates for same countries , we can then do a real comparison of who is doing well rather than your Tory cult ideas of success.
Deflect, blame, ignore.
You don't want the Scottish government to improve its rate of vaccination?
I want them to improve of course, but yet again you highlight your bias with your selective numbers. I am happy that Scotland has lower death rate , lower positivity rate and lower vaccination rate. I look at the big picture , you on the other hand ignore the devastating other numbers and focus on the one good part. When we are all vaccinated , Scotland a week or so behind England but England still having 40% higher death rate and probably world champions, will you still be crowing.
Sounds like you are the one crowing about deaths in England. Unless you've got a time machine you can't change the past - all we can change is the present and the future - but you and the SNP seem very defensive over Scotland's slower vaccination rate, now the "care homes first" rationale has run out of road.
Trying to avoid the point yet again. Post the numbers or prove that you are a ne'er do well. I know for a fact you will not post the real data, cowards like you just hide in the shadows and post misinformation. Not very pleasant.
I'm sure you can google like anyone else - I'm not your data service. Yes, the death numbers in England are worse - for many reasons, some of which will be government (in)action, others will not.
The point is "where we are today" and "what we could do better". Which you don't want to engage with. Lets hope the new "super centres" in Aberdeen & Edinburgh pick up the pace, but there's a lot of pace to pick up.
Yes you only want to discuss selected data , we know you of old. I prefer to look at all the data and do not pick the small part that is good for my point. For sure I am certain you will never post anything positive about Scotland. I will continue to view your data in with that in mind, knowing it will at best be partial and slanted.
It's not about you or me - its about how well the SNP government is doing at rolling out vaccines.
Well go then regale us on how well England is doing on deaths then. You only select certain items that are bad for Scotland , you ignore all the good data and do the converse for England. Trying to make out that your odd choice is the only topic to be considered is a pathetic attempt at hiding your hatred for Scotland. I will never see you ever post anything positive about Scotland. It is all about you and your bitter twisted hatred of Scotland, not good for your health all that bile and bitterness.
I'm not the one who rants. When the Scottish Government (not "Scotland") started its "care homes first" strategy I wondered whether that - or the England/Wales/NI approach of "blended 1 & 2" would prove more effective" and it would be interesting to find out.
Sadly the Scottish Government (not "Scotland") appears to have treated it as "either/or" not "and".
Never mind - looks like the British Army will be helping out. I expect you're pleased.
Comments
#SacklersAreSaviours
Had Covid? You May Need Only One Dose of Vaccine, Study Suggests
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/01/health/have-you-had-covid-19-coronavirus.html
...“I think one vaccination should be sufficient,” said Florian Krammer, a virologist at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and an author on the study. “This would also spare individuals from unnecessary pain when getting the second dose and it would free up additional vaccine doses.”...
...other immunologists suggest everyone stick to two doses. “I’m a big proponent of the right dosing and right schedule, because that’s how the studies were performed,” said Maria Elena Bottazzi, an immunologist at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston...
How many does she want in a clinical trial? 20million?
Did Sturgeon or a spokesperson or anyone else from the SNP chip in - in the time period between A16 being invoked and it being withdrawn? When every single party relevant to Northern Ireland did and unanimously on the same side?
Or did the SNP decide that Scotland was irrelevant to Northern Ireland?
Why do you want to hamper the global vaccination effort - and by implication prolong the pandemic and increase the risk of malign mutations - by refusing to release any of our copious stocks and pipeline until we are 100% sorted ourselves even if that takes ages and even then (indeed especially then) we can't open our borders and have to live for years like Vincent Price in The Masque of the Red Death?
This is why it was moral and ethical to embark on the mass efficacy trials. Which were signed off by the various regulators, round the world, on the basis of the results of the safety trials.
https://twitter.com/NHoultCricket/status/1356565049570189312
Of course that assumes they can be got rid of.............................
Maybe that's a reason they are less vaccine crazy than Britain?
If those are the choices then the option is obvious: We invent the world's first digital customs border.
Because the alternative: The GFA collapses and potentially the peace is worse.
That should have been the obvious solution all along, but regrettably years were wasted with the idea of keeping the UK in the EU's customs border. Thankfully that idea was killed before birth. So now we have the Protocol, which reality is showing isn't viable.
The pressure now is where it always should have been. Ireland isn't going to join the UK, the UK isn't going to join the UK, we want peace - Once you've eliminated the impossible the only option left, however improbable, is the solution. A digital system is all that is left.
Trusted traders, self-declarations and a mutual recognition of SPS rather than demanding SPS checks be done. Do that etc and its job done.
Who wouldn't want them anyway because they might be unsafe, but best they steal them from us in any event.... for some reason.
everyone is counting the same way
Hmmn.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9213727/Two-thirds-Londons-ultra-Orthodox-Jewish-community-Covid-year.html
The UK not being fully vaccinated, so the UK isn't fully open domestically, so the UK economy is suppressed, so the UK's supply of global vaccine aid is suppressed hurts not helps the global vaccination effort.
Eight weeks of the UK being fully vaccinated would add £48bn of the UK GDP and add £240mn to the UK's foreign aid budget, let alone anything else we choose to spend. That's enough for us to add 120 million extra doses to global vaccination efforts, more than the amount of doses the UK is going to use domestically.
Why would you deny the rest of the world that aid from us?
We don't have "copious stocks", we are using all the stocks we get in. So that's delusional in thinking the UK can divert some "copious stocks" - any stocks we have should be used.
I have asked a number of times - has anyone got links to equivalents to the ONS infections surveys in other countries? They must be being carried out - it is such an obvious thing to do.
https://twitter.com/MhairiHunter/status/1356580961287299074?s=20
What did you make of the idea to adjust AZ second doses to the SA and Brazil variants rather than doing two complete new doses?
It could be a huge advantage wrt our 12 week policy.
"But there are audible strains in Tory constitutional politics, too. Just as the leading edge of Brexit nationalism is increasingly hostile to the unionist project of devolution, Conservatives show growing impatience with Best of Both Worlds thinking. The fact things work differently and unevenly across the “four nations” was meant to be the happy point of devolution, though now it is increasingly seen as an insult to British unity and largesse.
This tetchiness is even voiced by the self-styled “Minister for the Union”. Only weeks after privately condemning devolution as a “disaster”, the Prime Minister was reported to claim “that there would not have been a single Covid-19 vaccine in Scotland if it were up to Nicola Sturgeon’s party”. His meaning, a surrogate explained, was that size matters: “the UK is a major country, we’ve got sufficient clout to get the vaccines rolled out”. A fair point, but it remains notable that Johnson’s disdain for the SNP is seldom expressed in a unionist vocabulary, even when finessed and glossed by more tactful communicators. Indeed, it’s difficult to name a leading UK politician who gives the impression of viewing Scotland’s democracy as a cherished part of the British constitutional order, rather than a tiresome subfolder of the “major” state-nation."
https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2021/01/quiet-collapse-scottish-unionism
'COVID-19 policies might result in more life-years lost than saved'
https://twitter.com/LSEnews/status/1356558353347072001?s=20
BBC News - UK variant has mutated again, scientists say
The Kent variant of coronavirus that has been spreading around the UK appears to be undergoing some worrying new genetic changes, say scientists.
Tests on some samples show a mutation, called E484K, already seen in the South Africa and Brazil variants that are of concern.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-55900625
Since Professors Macron and von der Leyen have declared the vaccines dangerous... by not distributing them to the other countries, we are actually protecting them.
https://www.kentonline.co.uk/folkestone/news/the-kent-district-where-more-than-half-could-have-had-covid-240888/
There were only ever 4 viable solutions.
- The UK doesn't leave the EU afterall.
- The UK and EU find a workable solution.
- Violence.
- Turn a blind eye and allow trade to flow without the checks and without impediment.
The EU and their fans like your good self thought that by denying (2) and leaving (3) as horrific would force us down the route of (1), since apparently (4) was also unthinkable. Thankfully that's been put paid to now, the UK is out.So now it is (2), (3) or (4) that are the only options left. So either you choose violence - or you do whatever it takes to prevent it. Whatever it takes will either mean no solution whatsoever and there's no checks and the market has a big gaping hole to enter, or it will entail a digital solution.
The EU seemed to be under a misapprehension the only violent people to worry about in NI were the Nationalists. Them telling their people not to go to work today reveals otherwise. A viable alternative solution has to be found - and that is going to be bloody close to what Redwood etc were always suggesting. It doesn't matter how complex they are, a way needs to be found to get through those complexities if you want peace - peace is complex. NI is complex.
No doubt that will be looked at to see if any of that is due to adverse reaction to the vaccine, and it wouldn't be shocking if an adverse reaction contributed to the deaths of a small number of people (while saving many more). So you can say that real roll-out adds to the evidence that the vaccine is sufficiently safe, but can't really say 9 million have had the jab "without anyone falling over dead", as that's almost certainly wrong.
The MP will also probably appreciate a letter which isn't a whinge or abuse.
https://twitter.com/JohannBiermann1/status/1356151079101206528
He will have to do that himself. He is Prime Minister
I am far from sure he is capable.
I think you're probably right Britain has done worse than many neighbours on control of cases and deaths, and Malmesbury is being over-optimistic. But it can also be true that the published stats need to be treated with care and may not be directly comparable.
Don't know if can read too much into it
Fancy.
Won't the Oxford AZN updated vaccine have to go through trials again?
3 January France's excess death rate was 11% and their known Covid deaths and cases have risen since then.
France's case figures keep gradually rising, not exponentially but they're under a very strict curfew - the restrictions in France have been much greater than what they are here. You can't even leave your house in France without informing the Government that you are first and why. On current trends France will overtake the UK in cases per capita this week as we're still trending down and they're still trending up despite their extremely strict curfew.
"In short, the Prime Minister is in a terrible bind. Brexit has spiked his own best arguments. The Scots intensely dislike him, so he is damned if he ventures north and damned if he doesn’t. And in the wake of Brexit they are unlikely to be bought off with yet more financial bungs or constitutional fixes.
Sad to say, the Prime Minister’s best hope of saving the Union is that the SNP’s warring factions, the Salmondites and Sturgeonistas, tear themselves apart."
Some people are due their 2nd dose in 8 weeks now.
You get the occasional team from Germany or France, but they've generally had to work a hell of a lot harder gathering data from specific local providers. It's just hard to do.
Edit: The kind of mass testing for infection levels done here could of course have been done anywhere, but first you have to have the research capacity to design and run such an experiment.
Addicted to doom.
She played down the impact of government restrictions, saying that, in practice, there had been "no lockdown" in much of Soweto since people had often struggled to adhere to the rules.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-55333126
Using raw testing numbers from various countries simply doesn't work. The only way to do any kind of comparison is excess deaths - that, or a vast academic project to try and build a database of reconcilable numbers.
I think we're already trying that with the existing Pfizer/AZN shots (there was a report of a planned study starting in Jan), and animal studies suggests doing this produces the best immune response of all the vaccines.
A booster with a modified spike protein to match mutations on the more worrying variants ought to be an effective booster given everything we've seen so far.
Facilitated of course by many here in this country who wanted that too.
I highly doubt the NI Protocol will be renewed as-is in four years time when it is scheduled to (or whenever the first renewal is due), it may not even last that long. The solution for NI was always going to be to square the circle by putting it in everyone's interests to facilitate that. Now the EU are waking up to the fact the Unionist Community exists in NI and suddenly they're realising what that actually means.
If that results in logical compromises to fix the NI border that can be used for the greater UK/EU border too - mutual recognition on SPS etc - then so much the better.
Yorkshire was worst affected, leading to some coronavirus vaccinations being cancelled as people were warned against non-essential travel.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-55899744
The UK and EU could have found a workable solution. The problem was that we rejected every single one of the options as not being "proper" Brexit. Leaving the European Union is Brexit. What we do afterwards doesn't change that we have left.
The reality of your position Philip and that of so many Conservative and Unionist MPs is that the Union can go hang in exchange for the prize.
But whether he is tough enough to face down the increasingly empowered authoritarians in and around government is a bigger question.
I guess opportunity cost, but the expense is marginal, and it's probably quicker to not have to worry about the bureaucracy. Can one have too many COVID antibodies?
What have they given the world? Apartheid, vuvuzelas, and now this variant.
They need to take a good long hard at themselves.
I was merely pointing out that you could use selective data to prove any falsehood. Neither country comes out well and idiots wittering on about how awesome UK is at vaccination are just ignoring the dire state of the UK fight overall. It is not a national sport to be boasting about , most unedifying the gloating that goes on here, especially when you look at overall picture.
Bang to rights - can't find it.
I may have got SNP muddled up with Michael Gove's "Brussels made a mistake" from Saturday.
The government could test every person in the country every day and Labour would say why aren't we testing people's pets ..
It doesn't matter whether you dislike us having left the EEA or not anymore. Its done. The egg is broken and there's no putting Humpty Dumpty back together again.
You're approaching the whole thing backwards. You want to determine what the solution is and then choose a form of Brexit to match that. No, we choose a form of Brext (so having got a "proper" Brexit now) and now we need to find the workable solution that works with that.
It doesn't matter if no solution works yet. Invent one. Needs must and all that.
Otherwise, absolute hogwash.
(i) When we have the virus under control, the priority should be switched to the global effort.
(ii) We should not think about the global effort until we have vaccinated every single person in the UK.
Neither of these positions are immoral. Your perspective depends on your answers to various questions. What is the duty of a government? What is the right balance between national and international goals and obligations? For example, is it immoral to spend on foreign aid while we still have poverty here? What if global poverty were contagious and could be spread by human contact? Would that change things? What is meant by enlightened self-interest? Etc etc.
I've ignored the stupid personalizing stuff at the end. Like I said before, it's on the level of "Donate to HMRC then" as a response to somebody arguing for higher taxes. I just have no time for it.
There have been many mistakes, but Covid is going to go down in history as an amazing story of human endeavour, the first time we've been able to move so quickly to overcome a serious new disease without letting it wipe out large parts of the population (I know the death toll has been bad, but nothing compared to those seen historically and nothing compared to the deaths we would have seen if we'd not done anything).
The EU decided a UK trade deal could only be agreed with a border between NI and GB and it should not be surprised if extremist Unionists and offshoots of the old loyalist paramilitaries now start to threaten border officials at the NI and GB border unfortunately
Russia's Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine gives around 92% protection against Covid-19, late stage trial results published in The Lancet reveal.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-55900622
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)00234-8/fulltext
Sadly the Scottish Government (not "Scotland") appears to have treated it as "either/or" not "and".
Never mind - looks like the British Army will be helping out. I expect you're pleased.