Check out this chart... Israel vaccinated the elderly first (not the younger ones) and you can see the blue lines dropping off quite starkly.
playing devils advocate, shouldn’t shop workers be ahead of teachers? The girls on the tills probably come into more context with high numbers of humans than most.
I said that: what’s the point in vaccinations for the elderly who should be staying at home anyways. It should have been the people who will propel the economy first. The retired should have waited and stayed at home. Now all that’s going to happen is all these old ****ers are going to think they are invincible with all that spare time spreading that **** without a care in the world.
Getting kids out of depressed, abusive and stressed homes and into education is ****ing critical. Vaccinating old people who shouldn’t even be out risking it whilst putting thousands of kids at ongoing risk and leaving thousands of parents not earning and stressing is ****ing madness.
NHS staff I can’t understand why Teachers? How many teachers have died from covid? Thousands of over 60 have so over 60’s should be first. didn’t read your next post. Agree kids should be back to school but the evidence for schools being hot beds of covid is very very thin. It’s unions again causing mischief as they hate the conservatives
Typically daft, blinkered thinning. Ask childline what the priority should be. The Government didn’t either.
I think the objective of vaccinating the elderly and most vulnerable first is to protect the NHS and limit the loss of life. While it can affect any age group, they are the most likely to require hospitalisation and the most likely to die. No amount of isolating or shielding can have the same impact as a vaccine. They still need to eat so require to either go shopping, or have deliveries. Many require care which also brings them into contact with people. It is also important to protect those coming into contact with them, so all carers and NHS staff should also be getting vaccinated as a priority.
I agree kids should be back at school but it has nothing to do with teachers falling massively ill of covid or the fact it’s the schools that are fuelling the spikes in cases. It’s the unions stopping schools opening and some lazy teachers (not all) who can’t be arsed to work. my son is going to comp next year and missing loads of one on one teaching while 15 other kids from his class get face to face teaching that isn’t fair. My daughter 9 is autistic has very little speech and can’t read she is missing out on a load of schooling that will help her when she is older to live as normal a life as possible. Schools should be open and teachers should do their job like the shop workers, Bon men, police and all front line workers have to but unfortunately for them they don’t have a Labour backed union to cause bother and pressure the government without any actual data that shows schools are the problem.
Hasn’t a teaching union come out and said something like.. if teachers have the vaccine then schools are still a hotbed for the virus so we’re not sure teachers should go back even after one?
So there's a couple of things I wonder my be driving this approach. The current number of vacinnes we have is limited, right? It increases over time but right now we don't have the capacity to mass across the whole economy. So if you base it on economic output, then what's the threshold? Who qualifies? Everyone who works in a supermarket? If they do one day a week? So you need to prioritise. It makes sense to do the elderly first for a number of reasons, mainly because they are at the highest risk. The government prirotisies those in care homes because they come into contact with most others. Then focusing on the elderly population makes sense. It's all well and good just saying that 80 year olds should stay at home but they'd still need to come into contact with individuals - carers, hospital staff, their family etc. Since they're such high risk then it seems like a huge political and moral gamble to not prioritise them. As I understand key workers including at the NHS are getting vaccines - last month Trusts were tasked with rolling this out to the their staff. The problem with then prioritising teachers is a) capacity as I set out above but also the knock on effects. You wouldn't be vaccinating the kids, or bus drivers / support staff etc (you don't have capacity) but they can all spread the virus. You then run the risk of super spreader events infecting those that haven't yet had the vaccine. The government approach isn't flawless by any means but seems pretty sensible to me.
nailed it and this is where I am. Protect the elderly and vulnerable then open up society again (economy is fooked) but focus on NHS and carers first. Seen on the news today that some in Whitehall say that by end of May all adults in the UK may have been offered the first dose. If this is true then by the time Summer comes we could be looking at a degree of normality. thise Israeli charts suggest the vaccine, after 6 weeks shows some very clear and measurable results. by that measure, I’d say that by the end of next week we will start to see something similar in the UK. Teachers should be in a specific cohort ahead of the general population yes. But NHS and carers have to be the priority for me. my kids can easily do another month or two at home if needs be. Tech helps them keep in touch and schooling whilst not ideal is functional and they seem reasonably content.
the union yes. Not the teachers. My wife is a teacher and she knows full well how left of centre the unions are and how politically motivated they are. She sees little value in the union these days.
We have to take our hat off to the government for the vaccine program. They have been quite relentless. I know some stuff behind the scenes too and have seen first hand how driven and collaborative they are with industry.
The over 80's should have been last. Teachers, health care workers and the medically vulnerable under the age of 50 should have been first.
