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1 hour ago, Barry Brockes said:

Quite a few people in this part of the world trying to change their appointment from a known AZ centre to a known Pfizer centre.

But is there evidence that the Pfizer one fares any better?  If they have targeted the same areas then its probably 6 of 1 , half a dozen of the other

Edited by Barbe bleu

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9 minutes ago, Barbe bleu said:

But is there evidence that rhe Pfizer one greatest amy better?  If they have targetted the same areas then its probably 6 of 1 , half a dozen of the other

I'm pretty sure that Pfizer have annouced that their vaccine is effective against the South African variant although they are still working on establishing whether the efficacy is as high as for the other variants. But that would still seem to put it well ahead of the Oxford vaccine as far as the SA variant is concerned.

I don't think that the '6 of 1 and half a dozen of the other' approach is one that is much favoured amongst medical researchers or licensing authorities 😀

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National

14104 - 333

Local

Bit of a jump locally, hopefully just a blip

image.png.8bcd404a1c9cac0ffa6e1c3a97f86d22.png

image.png.11ba89572852455cc9823056632e9950.png

image.thumb.png.c95737c5a2d47e8e477f6253808a1418.png

Weekend effect plus weather problems perhaps.

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1 hour ago, Well b back said:

The WHO held their meeting today so it will be very interesting to see their outcome as the Oxford vaccine is an important part of their strategy and there are nearly a billion doses that will be prepared by The Serum Institute of India. Personally I think they will find a way to approve it, but it certainly isn’t a given.

It is preventing hospitalisations and deaths. In which case, people getting a very mild illness should be neither here nor there.

 

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36 minutes ago, ricardo said:

It is preventing hospitalisations and deaths. In which case, people getting a very mild illness should be neither here nor there.

 

I am sure it will but unfortunately regards the South African variant there is no data to support that. 
In the U.K. the Oxford vaccine works well against our dominant strain the Kent variant, and we should be able to keep the South African variant at bay until August, when a booster is available.

My suggestion was do we swap our Pfizer orders for the millions of doses of AstraZeneca available around the world ? 

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For 360 days of the year, on average, I'm delighted that we live in the middle of nowhere but today was one of the other five days. We are totally snowed in and I was unable to keep the appointment for my vaccination.

One thing I did learn today was that you can't cancel your appointment on 119 if it is the day of your appointment. 119 gave me a number to call for the Food Court Vaccination Centre in Castle Quarter in Norwich to cancel my appointment but that turned out to be the number of the irate manager of the Food Court itself who was fed up with receiving such calls. It appears the vaccination centre itself doesn't have a phone.

A further call to 119 established that if you need to cancel your appointment on the day you don't need to let anyone know, just don't turn up, your appointment will be cancelled on the system overnight and you can start again the next day.

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23 minutes ago, Well b back said:

I am sure it will but unfortunately regards the South African variant there is no data to support that. 
In the U.K. the Oxford vaccine works well against our dominant strain the Kent variant, and we should be able to keep the South African variant at bay until August, when a booster is available.

My suggestion was do we swap our Pfizer orders for the millions of doses of AstraZeneca available around the world ? 

I would keep going as we are.  AZ is doing to do the job we need it to do now and changing horses half-way will stall the roll out and cause people to die.

SA strain seems  to reduce efficacy of neutalisation across the board and, who knows, we might get a mutation that escapes Pfizer and is susceptible to AZ in the near future.

I wouldnt swap 'their' AZ for  our Pfizer either just in case it is a magic formula.

 

 

 

Edited by Barbe bleu

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7 minutes ago, Barry Brockes said:

For 360 days of the year, on average, I'm delighted that we live in the middle of nowhere but today was one of the other five days. We are totally snowed in and I was unable to keep the appointment for my vaccination.

One thing I did learn today was that you can't cancel your appointment on 119 if it is the day of your appointment. 119 gave me a number to call for the Food Court Vaccination Centre in Castle Quarter in Norwich to cancel my appointment but that turned out to be the number of the irate manager of the Food Court itself who was fed up with receiving such calls. It appears the vaccination centre itself doesn't have a phone.

A further call to 119 established that if you need to cancel your appointment on the day you don't need to let anyone know, just don't turn up, your appointment will be cancelled on the system overnight and you can start again the next day.

Hi Barry

See my post above yours giving details of how to rebook. If you are over 70 you can book at anytime, hope that helps.

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Thanks WBB. I'm 70 by a few days and as my wife is in the next group ie 65 - 69 we're hoping that group is opened up in the next day or two so we can each make an appointment at the same time and cut down on the number of journeys we make.

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14 minutes ago, Barry Brockes said:

Thanks WBB. I'm 70 by a few days and as my wife is in the next group ie 65 - 69 we're hoping that group is opened up in the next day or two so we can each make an appointment at the same time and cut down on the number of journeys we make.

Good news.

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Dont let’s get too down about all this, as has been said the overwhelmingly dominant covid virus in the UK is the Kent variant and there is good evidence that the AZ vaccine works well against that. This is what we need to concern ourselves with.
The study in SA leaked to the FT was very small and only involved young people, it’s not a demographic that we are hugely concerned with in terms of serious ill health. The new J&J vaccine had a much more extensive trial than this study and was shown to give good protection against severe ill health even against the type of variant in SA!  The J &J vaccine is very similar to the AZ and causes similar antibodies to be produced!
The crucial thing for us is to get the infection rate down and prevent people becoming very ill and dying, let’s stay focused on that and not get too hung up over studies and reports that are not directly relevant to our current situation here.

Just to add this from Fauci this evening......

Fauci says vaccinate quickly to fight COVID-19 variants

(Reuters) - The best defense against the evolution of COVID-19 and the emergence of variant strains is getting as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible, top U.S. infectious disease doctor Anthony Fauci said on a Monday media briefing.

Edited by Van wink
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42 minutes ago, Van wink said:

Dont let’s get too down about all this, as has been said the overwhelmingly dominant covid virus in the UK is the Kent variant and there is good evidence that the AZ vaccine works well against that. This is what we need to concern ourselves with.
The study in SA leaked to the FT was very small and only involved young people, it’s not a demographic that we are hugely concerned with in terms of serious ill health. The new J&J vaccine had a much more extensive trial than this study and was shown to give good protection against severe ill health even against the type of variant in SA!  The J &J vaccine is very similar to the AZ and causes similar antibodies to be produced!
The crucial thing for us is to get the infection rate down and prevent people becoming very ill and dying, let’s stay focused on that and not get too hung up over studies and reports that are not directly relevant to our current situation here.

Just to add this from Fauci this evening......

Fauci says vaccinate quickly to fight COVID-19 variants

(Reuters) - The best defense against the evolution of COVID-19 and the emergence of variant strains is getting as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible, top U.S. infectious disease doctor Anthony Fauci said on a Monday media briefing.

 

Yes - I would add and to get the prevalence down by as many means as possible!

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Wouldn’t it be great to have some good news, the vaccine was, now isn’t, the football was, now isn’t, the weather was, now isn’t. Am I the only one getting really, really fed up ?

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33 minutes ago, CANARYKING said:

Wouldn’t it be great to have some good news, the vaccine was, now isn’t, the football was, now isn’t, the weather was, now isn’t. Am I the only one getting really, really fed up ?

The vaccine is good news CK. Just keep an eye on the figures on reducing hospital admissions. We must also trust Van Tam on this.

And whilst there may be blip along the way we must look at the overall trend.

As for the football, maybe a nice solid victory over a tough, defensive minded Stoke this weekend will provide us all with belief. A nice 3 or 4 goal haul will do.

And finally, the weather will change this weekend (Sunday to be precise) and if you look hard enough there are snow drops and daffodils coming through in gardens and parks 🙂

 

Edited by sonyc
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A team of international experts investigating the origins of Covid-19 have all but dismissed a theory that the virus came from a laboratory.

Peter Ben Embarek, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) mission, said it was "extremely unlikely" that the virus leaked from a lab in the Chinese city of Wuhan. He said more work was needed to identify the source of the virus. The comments came at the conclusion of a joint WHO-China mission. Their search for clues also included a visit to the now-famous wet market in Huanan - selling fish, meat and live wild animals - that was linked to some of the first human cases. The team say the virus may have jumped from animals to humans, but they don't have the proof yet. Possible carriers include bats and pangolins, but tests so far have yet to find convincing evidence for this.

Ah, right that's it then - done and dusted. It was magic. China now saying wasn't them, didn't affect them much, they weren't ready for it but still managed to keep the death rate down to 4,500 without a vaccine. A work of fiction by Roald Dahl. China's reputation intact, shiny and bulletproof. Thank you WHO.....

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Yes...this whole WHO visit to China was always going to be a complete waste of time, a non event. What point there was visting the food market there more than a year after the original outbreak there is a mystery. As for China itself, of course they will to time indefinite repeat their line of it wasnt their fault or the virus never originated there. Its a continual varbatim Trump type nonsense line similar to his repeated a million times "elections were a fraud". Of course the one man Trump was easily proven wrong by the democratic voting machine of America...but the WHO changing China's take on things is vastly different.

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I think the WHO are mistaken if they think they can really tell us what happened. I doubt anything would have stopped it occurring in China. Their lifestyle may portray Shanghai in the ads, but in reality, so much is squalid, to us, open markets.

Where it became a pandemic was the failure of China to warn us and Governments to act properly.

 

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So Mr Hancock should we applaud the NHS or follow the example of your personal £32, 000 donor and slag them off?

https://labour.org.uk/press/labour-calls-for-health-secretary-to-pay-back-donations-after-disgraceful-attack-on-nhs-heroes/

Labour is demanding that Matt Hancock condemns a report published by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) and pay back the donations he has received from the organisation’s Chair. The report argues that there is “no rational basis” for the public support NHS staff are receiving, “no reason” to be grateful for the NHS and criticising the “false narrative” that the NHS has done an amazing job during the pandemic.

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2 minutes ago, horsefly said:

So Mr Hancock should we applaud the NHS or follow the example of your personal £32, 000 donor and slag them off?

https://labour.org.uk/press/labour-calls-for-health-secretary-to-pay-back-donations-after-disgraceful-attack-on-nhs-heroes/

Labour is demanding that Matt Hancock condemns a report published by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) and pay back the donations he has received from the organisation’s Chair. The report argues that there is “no rational basis” for the public support NHS staff are receiving, “no reason” to be grateful for the NHS and criticising the “false narrative” that the NHS has done an amazing job during the pandemic.

Careful, it will bring tears to Hancock's eyes.😭

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Just now, keelansgrandad said:

Careful, it will bring tears to Hancock's eyes.😭

He'd be perfect in the part of the crocodile in Peter Pan

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2 minutes ago, horsefly said:

He'd be perfect in the part of the crocodile in Peter Pan

Have you seen how many are on an earner in the IEA. What do they do? What do they produce? Most seemed academics or fiscal management.

From what I can read, they offer a lot of advice in areas they have never been involved in. Is that called arrogance?

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1 minute ago, keelansgrandad said:

Have you seen how many are on an earner in the IEA. What do they do? What do they produce? Most seemed academics or fiscal management.

From what I can read, they offer a lot of advice in areas they have never been involved in. Is that called arrogance?

"Arrogance" is putting it mildly. I'd go for "A bunch of ..." and I have several words to replace the ellipsis

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So the Govt is now introducing quarantine hotels for people from countries like South Africa plus 2 tests for people who arrive from anywhere plus harsher penalties for people who eg lie about where they’ve come from up to 10 years in prison.

 

Personally I think this is absolutely right, to get life back to normal we need to control people coming in much more strictly to stop variants taking root here.

 

we can’t simply shut our borders because we import most of our food, medicines and other goods we use day to day.

 

Could we shut down all other travel? Anyone who thinks this is realistic should watch the grilling given to the Govt minister this morning on the news about the above proposals (which stop well short of actually shutting our borders) and the complaints from the travel industry which the news media simply repeat verbatim.

 

I was disappointed the BBC didn’t reflect the other side of the argument ie how important it is to impose controls and prevent new variants coming in while our vaccine programme is rolled out.

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Also I think the 10 year prison term is really important- it would be very easy for someone in Portugal to drive to Spain and get a flight from there and lie about where they’ve come from. The risk of going to jail for that long should make people think twice about it.

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10 minutes ago, It's Character Forming said:

Also I think the 10 year prison term is really important- it would be very easy for someone in Portugal to drive to Spain and get a flight from there and lie about where they’ve come from. The risk of going to jail for that long should make people think twice about it.

Can we backdate this punishment? Asking for a fiend. 😉

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8 minutes ago, It's Character Forming said:

Also I think the 10 year prison term is really important- it would be very easy for someone in Portugal to drive to Spain and get a flight from there and lie about where they’ve come from. The risk of going to jail for that long should make people think twice about it.

The 10-year prison threat does seem over-the-top but is probably a necessary corrective after they completely undermined the whole idea of abiding by lockdown restrictions from the very beginning when they gave carte blanche to Dominic Cummings to breach the regulations at will.

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