Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Billy Jean King]

Will be annoyed as one of the few times I leave the house just now is to nip to the subway or Baynes near my house for lunch on a Friday. When you see things like this it’s no wonder they’re having to implement restrictions here.

The queues are not that unusual as it's 2 in 2 out or something like that. They snake along the fairly narrow pavement so you can see the issue. I was genuinely surprised at the number of school age kids out and about as if it was a Sunday. Mostly with a parent (s) not with their mates.

[madwullie]

Facebook maw on hamilton news stand who argued last spring that masks were a restriction of liberty and the govt's plan to turn us all into biddable drones, and commented that she would be using her "asthma" to ensure she wouldn't have one, had the absolute cheek to come on last week and moan about how someone had tutted at her in morrisons, and how it was disgraceful given she was exempt. What a fucking boot. 

[madwullie]

29 minutes ago, renton said:

Am I right in thinking that the AZ vaccine only became available yesterday?

Here yes, AFAIK. Wife got hers yesterday and was a bit worried it would be that one and not Pfizer. She got Pfizer 

[Paco]

Am I right in thinking that the AZ vaccine only became available yesterday?

Mostly. A handful of GP practices received them last week, probably not accounting for more than 1000 or so vaccinations in total. However the SG claim is now that each health board has taken delivery and so the pace should be vastly increased from this point forward.

There was little more that could be done up until yesterday, with AZ at least. We saw GP practices literally queueing round the block in London while there were barely any AZ doses in Scotland.

But the excuses are now finished. We have enough supply in the country. 12k in a day is not enough, I hope it’s either because health boards are still organising themselves or didn’t have full appointments set up based on a slew of broken promises last week.

560k first doses promised by end of January/very early Feb, as per Freeman yesterday. We’ll call that Monday Feb 1st. 176k done as of the start of play, Tuesday 12th. Including today and weekends that means we’d need an average of 19,200 per day. Removing weekends (I’ve no idea what weekend service is being offered), about 27.5k per day.

I think that’s very achievable, but clearly it needs to get faster. I’m anticipating 35-40k a day by the end of the month as care homes are complete and resources can be diverted, so we might look like missing it and make it up at the end.

[welshbairn]

When they get the over 80s and housebound out of way it should be easier to ramp it up to conveyer belt stuff.

[Billy Jean King]

Here yes, AFAIK. Wife got hers yesterday and was a bit worried it would be that one and not Pfizer. She got Pfizer 

Why was she concerned at receiving the AZ vaccine if you don't mind me asking.

[madwullie]

3 minutes ago, Billy Jean King said:

19 minutes ago, madwullie said:

Here yes, AFAIK. Wife got hers yesterday and was a bit worried it would be that one and not Pfizer. She got Pfizer 

Why was she concerned at receiving the AZ vaccine if you don't mind me asking.

I think it was the 70% rate. But I might be wrong. 

Edited January 12, 2021 by madwullie

[Inanimate Carbon Rod]

2 hours ago, welshbairn said:

They need a delivery system that's sustainable for many months, pulling staff off other patient centred duties to go mad jagging for a week while other appointments and procedures are cancelled, then to shut it down for a fortnight would be insane.

Erm the above description is exactly how GP practices will be delivering the vaccine? 

[ICTChris]

Wholesome side affect of Covid

https://www.bbc.com/news/amp/business-55629984?__twitter_impression=true

[latapythelegend]

14 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

When they get the over 80s and housebound out of way it should be easier to ramp it up to conveyer belt stuff.

This will make a very big differences. The time involved in GP's/nurses visiting bed bound people or care homes where residents are spread out, will probably equate to a greater amount of able bodied being able to queue at a practice or vaccination centre. Numbers should jump up quite significantly I'd imagine.

 

[welshbairn]

7 minutes ago, Inanimate Carbon Rod said:

Erm the above description is exactly how GP practices will be delivering the vaccine? 

Up here they're planning it much the same as they did the flu, set aside days for it full time, but more of them, the number depending on supplies. 

[WhiteRoseKillie]

3 hours ago, super_carson said:

Absolutely this.  I don't get why more isn't being made of this seeing as we were told ever since March that a vaccine would herald the return of some sort of normality.  Once these were announced as effective, and then approved the narrative has changed.   We have diminishing targets for this month, issues with supply and government advisers saying that a vaccine won't necessarily be the remedy we were all hoping for.  It seems to me (and again, forgive my tinfoil hat-wearing here) that governments (both SG and WM) are not comfortable with the responsibility being on them to deliver the vaccine efficiently and are shifting the onus (and therefore blame) on to the wider population.  

 

On a wider point than just the vaccine - this has been the modus operandi of the Cúntservatives throughout this entire mess. The vast, vast majority of the population have complied with what they've been asked to do throughout - even the rules which sometimes seem illogical or even counterintuitive. Meanwhile, the likes of Jenrick, Cummings, Seely, Ellwood, Johnson (repeatedly) totally ignore the rules which they find inconvenient, while Hancock, Williamson and the rest of the cabinet blame their own failings on "Covid, innit?". This virus is fast becoming the UK's 9/1 when it comes to justifying oppressing the population.  When it goes breasts skyward, of course, they wheel out fúcking Hancock the sock puppet to explain it's all becuse we haven't "followed guidance". Note the language - from the start , we needed rules and laws, not fucking guidance. This approach allows these absolute cúnts to blame us for their incompetence - and by fúck, aren't they doing just that, aided by compliant media outlets. I am getting angrier by the day.

[s_dog]

4 hours ago, TheScarf said:

The SG's take on easing restrictions is worrying.  As has been said on here countless times, once the vulnerable and all front line NHS staff are vaccinated, meaning hospitals can easily cope, we should all be down to Tier 2 at worst, with some places at Tier 1 or better, no restrictions.

I love the easy acceptance that "as has been said on here countless times" appears to trump anything the Government & their advisors might think.  

 

3 hours ago, Paco said:

Another key difference at least between Scotland and England is the focus on care homes. Over 75% of residents have been done here, 40% or so in England. I suspect that process is a bit slower than lining them up at a GP practice.

 

1 hour ago, AyrExile said:

Those large vaccination centres in England could have taken months to organise. Small pieces of Information leaked out about those a while ago but never really heard much about Scotland’s plans until recently.. Time will tell but get the feeling Scotland could be a bit behind other countries in getting this rolled out 

Scotland & N.Ireland have both done slightly better in the first few weeks of vaccinations (as the now out-of-date travellingtabby graph shows with both Scot & N.Ire just above 2%, Eng & Wales both just below). But England have now jumped ahead in the past week (now at just over 4%, while Scotland are at just over 3%).  Looks like there are two main reasons for this. 

As Paco already mentioned, in Scotland we've clearly focused on the care home residents first as we're at around 75% of them being vaccinated whereas in England the only report I can see online is from last week saying "Boris Johnson confirmed earlier this week that just one  in 10 care home residents, and 14 per cent of staff, had been vaccinated so far." Vaccinating in care homes is obviously a more time-consuming process than any other part of the roll-out (except maybe GP's/nurses visiting the housebound).

Secondly, the pictures on the news showing over 80's queuing up for vaccines at GP surgeries, and being asked to travel 30-70 miles to these large vaccination centres. Two things here, again as someone has already mentioned, in Scotland we've only just been able to have the supplies of Oxford/AZ widely available to start vaccinating by GP's yesterday, not last week. And the plan in Scotland is not to use large scale vaccination centres for people above a certain age (might just be over-70s not sure?), as its considered a risk to make them travel and congregate in large numbers at them, instead they'll be vaccinated through a local GP practice. That'll be slower than what they are doing down South, but kinda makes sense does it not? 

The only people being asked to attend a larger scale vaccination centre, like the Louisa Jordan, right now are NHS & Social care workers. The fact that they are now moving on from just frontline NHS staff to wider NHS staff & social care, and the fact that they are already setting targets for the over 70's vaccinations to be complete do indicate that they are at least moving on a bit. And once they start to move down the age groups, they'll be able to use larger centres to vaccinate, which will inevitably be quicker. 

Don't think we can criticise too much right now, if the Scottish Government fail to meet their target of the over-70s by the end of Feb (that's right isn't it?), they'll be fair game for some criticism then.

Edited January 12, 2021 by s_dog

[HibsFan]

4 hours ago, MixuFruit said:

Can't help but feel there's too much attention being placed on irresponsible people in supermarkets and not enough on folk getting on the bus to go and work in call centres and estate agents, but we have throughout this thing seen a very determined effort by government and press to make this a problem of personal responsibility and not poor policy and poor implementation. 

Ding ding ding.

It's all about the workplaces.

The time of 100% compliance with lockdown rules has gone, people have caught on to a lot of them being a load of shite and will do their own thing (selfishly) now.

The one thing the UK government can do is legally enforce non-essential workplaces to close.

It's also the one thing they won't do, because that would force them to care financially for the affected companies + workers.

And meanwhile they're talking about the technicalities of drinking coffee and being sat on benches, as if any of that would fucking matter if they closed all unnecessary businesses tonight.

[effeffsee_the2nd]

3 minutes ago, HibsFan said:

Ding ding ding.

It's all about the workplaces.

The time of 100% compliance with lockdown rules has gone, people have caught on to a lot of them being a load of shite and will do their own thing (selfishly) now.

The one thing the UK government can do is legally enforce non-essential workplaces to close.

It's also the one thing they won't do, because that would force them to care financially for the affected companies + workers.

And meanwhile they're talking about the technicalities of drinking coffee and being sat on benches, as if any of that would fucking matter if they closed all unnecessary businesses tonight.

I do sympathise a wee bit tho, back in march there was still some home that this could be a short term thing and would blow over after a few months,  now we know it's a long haul they want to keep the economy ticking over so we don't have to rebuild the entire thing from scratch next year

[HibsFan]

1 minute ago, effeffsee_the2nd said:

I do sympathise a wee bit tho, back in march there was still some home that this could be a short term thing and would blow over after a few months,  now we know it's a long haul they want to keep the economy ticking over so we don't have to rebuild the entire thing from scratch next year

That's fine, then have that honest conversation, stop pretending we're in an 'all-in-this-together' lockdown and call this what it is.

A completely two-tier lockdown that allows the rich/employers to carry on living their lives and earning their crust, while the rest of us either sit indoors twiddling our thumbs or go into work and risk our lives to help protect the bottom line.

[WhiteRoseKillie]

3 hours ago, Marshmallo said:

It's literally a word rooted in a racial slur

 

I understand the more recent definition of the word "tinker", but back in the day, it simply defined a travelling mender/knife grinder. Like I said, it's not a word I'd use in a defamatory way, but as I also said, there are those on here who do like a wee bit of faux outrage.

It is certainly not "rooted" in a racial slur. It has, in fact, become associated with a racial group who are perceived to share characteristics with those who followed the profession of "tinkering".

 

 

[vikingTON]

19 minutes ago, s_dog said:

Don't think we can criticise too much right now, if the Scottish Government fail to meet their target of the over-70s by the end of Feb (that's right isn't it?), they'll be fair game for some criticism then.

Yet more goalpost shifting I see. Freeman stated that they would vaccinate 1 million people in Scotland by the end of this month. That's the benchmark and they'll be fair game for criticism if they get nowhere near that target. And if it's less than half a million at that point then Sturgeon should be resigning on top of Freeman.

[Bairnardo]

Yet more goalpost shifting I see. Freeman stated that they would vaccinate 1 million people in Scotland by the end of this month. That's the benchmark and they'll be fair game for criticism if they get nowhere near that target. And if it's less than half a million at that point then Sturgeon should be resigning on top of Freeman.

The blow this would cause to the independence pursuit would sadden me, but I have to agree with this. These people are in charge of returning our lives back to normal from a year of incredibly damaging restrictions. They have used up all of their slack as far as I am concerned, when they were able to play the "this is new an unprecedented" card. It's absolutely fair to judge them by performance from the moment the first vaccines were delivered to Scotland, and with the stakes being so high, I would expect anyone failing to meet their own targets to be considering their position.

Of course, British politics in general seems to be the land of the brass necks so it seems unlikely, but there has to be consequences if this takes longer than it had to because of the acts or omissions of the Scotrish Government

[Zapp Brannigan]

6 minutes ago, virginton said:

Sturgeon should be resigning on top of Freeman.