Paul O Mahoney
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No, they are still going to use them. They were simply storing them until they were vaccinating the under 65s and like us they probably are using a percentage on healthcare workers.
Delays in rolling out vaccine
- Thread starter tomdublin
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I think the government still somehow sees this mainly as a question of managing public expectations rather than of increasing actual performance. The first vaccine delivery in late December lingered in storage for a week because HSE staff didn't seem to want to disrupt their extended Christmas break. The resulting public outcry made the gov speed things up but with at best reluctant cooperation from the HSE. As for the government's refusal to even contemplate going outside the EU system to procure additional vaccine supplies, there is no rational explanation for it other than that it would require additional effort from various bureaucratic structures.
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Paul O Mahoney
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Well the figures don't support that, 9750 vaccines were received on the 26th of December from Pfizer and 2100 were given to frontline staff in various hospitals around the country from the 28th of December. These needed to be shipped so I can't see how they were held in storage or HSE staff weren't working to ensure all back office work was carried out.
Additionally a further 31200 was received in the week upto 3rd of January with a further 40950 the week starting the 4th of January which was the week the rollout to care homes began and 48393 first doses were administered to care homes and frontline workers. Obviously vaccines had to be sent to care homes around the country.
The idea that we should secure other supplies is nonsense to be honest, no country is going to give away vaccines when they are struggling with supplies themselves.
Securing other vaccines like Sputnik V or Sinochem is possible but neither of these vaccines are approved by the regulators, and I don't think unapproved vaccines should be used or purchased.
I'm certainly not defending the rollout and feel that things could have been done a lot better, having said that vaccinating people simply isn't getting vaccines and sticking it into people there are a slew of things that need to be done in the background.
The government needs to stop with the "announcements " of future vaccinations and simply get on with this , they and the HSE were very slow in getting actual information out and this resulted in all sorts opinions being formed.
If people want to know the facts and figures regarding the rollout here or all over Europe the information is freely available, but its easier to moan.
Except the figures aren't available. We don't know details about contractual delivery schedules because apparently it is commercially sensitive. All we get are vague figures about 1m vaccines due in April.
Ireland does not report up to date information and there is even a footnote in the European reporting that there might be differences because of timing issues. Simply because as the HSE admit, they still don't have a properly functioning reporting system.
We still don't have details about the numbers in each cohort, what % has been vaccinated and who is left. I know of frontline healthcare staff still waiting for their first dose yet a 21 year old office worker in the same hospital received one. Its almost the middle of March.
We are moving on to vaccinating people with underlying conditions. And it turns out that for the past year, nobody considered that we will need a way to identify these people so we are now scrambling to identify people involved so we actually have no accurate idea of the size of the cohort.
We don't know how many healthcare workers are still waiting for a vaccine. How many have refused to take one. Same with nursing homes. Same with over 80's. We are giving total administered doses but that is completely meaningless. I have yet to see any useful breakdown.
We have all over 70' vaccinated in one rural village while people over 85 are waiting in other locations.
We have GP's saying they are not being given proper notice or being communicated with.
It is plainly obvious that they are using the vaccines as they get them but the idea that there is detailed useful information about the rollout exists is just fanciful.
The HSE says it " hopes " to have all over-70s vaccinated by mid-May.
The NHS says it " expects " every adult in the UK to have received at least one vaccine dose by the end of May.
Vaccine doses administered per 100 population:
UK 33.9
Ireland 9.33
EU 8.7
These figures are an embarrassment for this country and the EU it outsourced its vaccination procurement programme to.
The NHS says it " expects " every adult in the UK to have received at least one vaccine dose by the end of May.
Vaccine doses administered per 100 population:
UK 33.9
Ireland 9.33
EU 8.7
These figures are an embarrassment for this country and the EU it outsourced its vaccination procurement programme to.
Several other (especially smaller) EU member states are currently negotiating purchase of additional vaccines pending their regulatory approval. Contracts for vaccines currently used in the EU likewise were negotiated before their approval by the EMA.
Paul O Mahoney
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There are many issues, I'm the first to admit that but there is data and its not difficult to get a broad view ( within 95% accuracy of what is going on.
You might want real time data but I just can't see how that would be achieved given the infrastructure that is being used.
Paul O Mahoney
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Again I know that and what if its not approved? If a contract was negotiated and the vaccine wasn't approved what do you think the masses would say?
Yes but Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna AZ etc are providing data regularly for months and in July initial results from trials were very encouraging thus contracts were signed in August September,have China or Russia shared anything in the same way?
I want those vaccines approved and distributed but risk also has to be managed.
I don't know this for sure but I'd imagine these contracts have a subject to approval clause. Even if not, the EU would have taken the same risk when procuring AZ & Pfizer before these had been approved.
Paul O Mahoney
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You missed the important point that Pfizer AZ etc were in constant touch and giving data to regulatory bodies from the time Stage 2 studies were started on a monthly basis, so regulators were aware of what was going on in detail never before seen.
That mitigated the risk.
EasilyAmused
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AFAIK Ireland has a higher percentage of people fully vaccinated that the U.K.
Also...
Covid deaths per 1,000,000 population:
UK 1,826
Ireland 888
More people die from COVID in the U.K. every eight hours that died in total in N.Z.
Also...
Covid deaths per 1,000,000 population:
UK 1,826
Ireland 888
More people die from COVID in the U.K. every eight hours that died in total in N.Z.
Every single data study, supported by the EMA and WHO, has backed the UK's initial policy decision to delay the second vaccine dose by up to nine weeks in order to vaccinatate the elderly and vulnerable with a first dose that prevents death or admission to hospital by more than 90% within three weeks of its delivery.
This idea that double-dosing the population is better than delaying the second dose is part of the disinformation spread by countries such as Germany and France to deflect attention from their appalling roll-out stats and they have both done dramatic U-turns on it.
I'm surprised you're still flogging that dead horse long after the stable door has been closed ...
And NZ is two small sparsely-populated mainly rural islands cut off from the rest of the world by their remote location whereas the UK is a heavily-populated,mainly urban global transport hub.
It's like comparing Ireland to the Isle of Man which has essentially eradictad Covid.
The official Irish Covid data hub has spent most of the roll-out updating vaccination figures weekly and even today the latest results are only available from Thursday.
If vaccine distribution and delivery is computerised which Gold help us they surely must be the collated results should be available daily at the press of a computer key as they are in the UK.
EasilyAmused
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Vietnam has a population of almost 100,000,000. The population of Ho Chi Minh City is almost 9,000,000.
There have been 35 Covid deaths.
U.K. has a population of almost 60,000,000. The population of London is almost 9,000,000.
There have been 125,000 Covid deaths.
The U.K.’s handling of Covid has been a calamity.
1,826 Covid deaths per million population.
The fourth worse record on the planet. And they’re not that far behind Slovenia. A bronze-tinted lead medal by the end of March awaits.
Personally, I’d prefer to be alive and waiting for a vaccine along with my peers, than dead and buried with my peers half vaccinated.
There have been 35 Covid deaths.
U.K. has a population of almost 60,000,000. The population of London is almost 9,000,000.
There have been 125,000 Covid deaths.
The U.K.’s handling of Covid has been a calamity.
1,826 Covid deaths per million population.
The fourth worse record on the planet. And they’re not that far behind Slovenia. A bronze-tinted lead medal by the end of March awaits.
Personally, I’d prefer to be alive and waiting for a vaccine along with my peers, than dead and buried with my peers half vaccinated.
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Paul O Mahoney
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There are daily figures available from the HSE website and they go back to February.
The UK system is a better system thats accepted.
Unless you can explain how Vietnams low deaths are due to vaccination strategy I see zero relevance to the current discussion.
A country's strategy for one aspect of dealing with the virus can be good or bad.
They can be bad at and good at y.
The one thing tells us nothing about the other.
Either delaying the second vaccine makes sense or it doesnt.
I suppose it depends on one's age.
At mine I think I'd rather have a single dose and a 90+% less chance of dying for the next few months as well as the prospect of being able to travel, meet my family and go back to work.
Rather than wait for an as yet unspecified date as to when any of these things might happen.
Paul O Mahoney
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What vaccine offers 90% less chance of dying or allowing travel?
Studies so far have said that a single dose of most gives anything over 70% with the second dose getting 90% plus.
If a single dose gave 90+% effectiveness there'd be no need for a second dose which is clearly not happening.
It was the results of a Scottish survey published a couple of weeks ago.
Also cited by Germany and France as their reason for reversing their previous opposition to the policy of a delayed second dose.
Covered extensively in the Irish media at the time.
Ironically the much-maligned AZ jab performed even better than the previous gold standard Pfizer.
Oxford vaccine more effective than Pfizer jab, new figures show
A single shot of either the Oxford-AstraZeneca or Pfizer jab cuts the chance of needing hospital treatment by more than 90 per cent, 'real world' results from the NHS show.
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I’m really sick of listening to Pearse Doherty criticising the roll-out as if it was a complete shambles. Clearly in the Narnia-world of opposition politics, nothing ever goes wrong, no delays, no hiccups, no glitches. It must be wonderful to live in such a fairytale world (though it seems to work less well in NI where SF are in power?).
This is a roll-out of a programme unprecedented in recent times. Hardly surprising that a few GPs didn’t get the vaccine delivered on time. Pearse seems to think that the Government can vaccinate people with vaccines that haven’t yet arrived.
This is a roll-out of a programme unprecedented in recent times. Hardly surprising that a few GPs didn’t get the vaccine delivered on time. Pearse seems to think that the Government can vaccinate people with vaccines that haven’t yet arrived.