Browsed by
Category: Coronavirus

Johnson will find it hard taking the plaudits for the vaccination success and continuing with a strict lockdown

Johnson will find it hard taking the plaudits for the vaccination success and continuing with a strict lockdown

Comments 0 Comment

A big development overnight in the fight against COVID has been the news that the death rate amongst the over 80s has dropped a massive 62% in a month. This group, of course, was first in line for the jab and this figure really underlines the success of the government’s big gamble last summer to ensure rapid early supplies of vaccines. But this good news is going to make the decisions on the next stage of lockdown that much harder….

Read More Read More

IN (FEINT) PRAISE OF URSULA VON DER LEYEN

IN (FEINT) PRAISE OF URSULA VON DER LEYEN

Comments 0 Comment

Who would have guessed that a month and a half after Britain finally left the European Single Market and Customs Union that it would be the European Commission President who is under the most pressure with some calls for her to resign? Or that German press could be leading with headlines like “the best advert for Brexit”? The EU’s vaccine debacle has certainly become the main international story which has led to a renewed focus on the politician who heads…

Read More Read More

From Absence to Shortage to Glut – Covid 19 Vaccines in Just Nine Months

From Absence to Shortage to Glut – Covid 19 Vaccines in Just Nine Months

Comments 0 Comment

Pic YouTube The COVID equivalent of the WW2 Manhatten Project Just fourteen weeks ago, at the beginning of November, there was scepticism from many about whether a Covid vaccine would be possible, even given the low bar (50% efficacy against moderate symptoms) set by the World Health Organisation and the FDA. And even if one of the vaccine candidates did work, could it be produced in volume? Since then, we have seen a few things happen in vaccine land. The…

Read More Read More

Polling in 15 of the world’s leading countries finds Brits at the top of the league on wanting to be vaccinated

Polling in 15 of the world’s leading countries finds Brits at the top of the league on wanting to be vaccinated

Comments 0 Comment

Source Ipsos Of all 15 countries surveyed by Ipsos, the United Kingdom shows the highest level of vaccination intent: Nine in ten British adults (89%) who say they have not been vaccinated against COVID-19 agree they would get a vaccine if it were available. Among the other countries, intent to take a COVID-19 vaccine is: Very high in Brazil (88%), China (85%), Mexico (85%), Italy (80%), Spain (80%), Canada (79%), and South Korea (78%); Fairly high in Australia (73%), the…

Read More Read More

What should Britain do with any excess vaccines – the Referendum divide

What should Britain do with any excess vaccines – the Referendum divide

Comments 0 Comment

Remainers more likely than Leavers to back the idea New polling from Ipsos finds a significant Brexit divide on what Britain should do about any surplus of vaccine that it night find it has. For those who voted Remain in 2016 are markedly more likely to want to share any excess vaccines with 66% saying the UK should pass on some of its extra doses. This compares with only half (50%) of those who voted to leave the EU saying…

Read More Read More

Crisis Management: EU-style

Crisis Management: EU-style

Comments 0 Comment

An object lesson on how not to deal with a problem The EU Commission has given us a quite astonishing master-class in the last few days of how not to deal with a problem: panic, untrue or incomplete public statements, trying to negotiate in public, invitations sounding like threats, displays of wounded amour propre, petulant complaining, shrill demands, recourse to legal arguments, followed by peremptory action taken without proper consultation with those affected, only to be withdrawn – somewhat humiliatingly –…

Read More Read More

Powerful front page from the Daily Mail as UK COVID deaths top 100k

Powerful front page from the Daily Mail as UK COVID deaths top 100k

Comments 0 Comment

Today’s Daily Mail front pages looks set to one of those that will be remembered and referred back to in the time to come. You can see it being used as one of the pics in the biographies that are likely to be written after he has stood down and will also be clipped for posterity by obituary writers. COVID has been the defining part of his premiership so far and it is still going on with the fatalities having…

Read More Read More

Back to British politics for a change and a possible threat to Boris

Back to British politics for a change and a possible threat to Boris

Comments 0 Comment

Making such a call at “peak COVID” appears naive The problem with this attack by Steve Baker is that all the efforts to control the pandemic according to the polling are supported by significant numbers. This to the question “Do you think that the UK Government is currently overreacting, or underreacting, to the Coronavirus?” Opinium found last week just 15% saying the former with 44% saying “underreacting”. By 72% of those in the same poll thought that the government hadn’t…

Read More Read More