New Regulations from Ist of February 2022 - Page 5

Hi,

  the ONS themselves have responded to claims that "only"17,000 people have died from covid, a figure based on the link you provided are factually incorrect and highly misleading. 

https://blog.ons.gov.uk/2022/01/26/to-say-only-17000-people-have-died-from-covid-19-is-highly-misleading/

The UK covid death figures may or may not be overstated but in any event as of 14th January 2022 there have been 149,748 excess deaths since the covid outbreak began, ONS figures reported daily on the BBC. That's not a number to compare with a bad flu season!

The Bloomberg, the Fortune and the Reuters articles you have forwarded all talk about not rushing into a 2nd booster/4th jab. The EU and the UK medical authorities both agree with this view, there are no plans at present for a 4th dose.

 There are numerous reports and news articles stating that the vast majority of those in intensive care and those that unfortunately go on to die from covid are unvaccinated. The vaccines do not totally stop you from getting covid but they do drastically reduce the chances of hospitalisation and death. The report below from the US puts the figure as a 14 times higher chance of dying if unvaccinated versus fully vaccinated.

https://www.webmd.com/vaccines/covid-19-vaccine/news/20211124/unvaccinated-14-times-more-likely-to-die-from-covid

The vaccination rate amongst health professionals in England is 94.6%, I would prefer to go along with that massive majority rather than the 5.4% who are not. 

https://www.bmj.com/content/376/bmj.o192 

Getting back to the original topic of this post, it is clear that to travel easily around Europe people must be fully vaccinated, that means at the moment 3 doses.

Rgds,

Aitch.

It is very unfair to impose this on the over 12's, so strictly. My daughter is 12 on 9th July, and we are due out at the end of July and the end of August (flights booked months ago). She won't be able to have the 2nd jab until October, through no fault of her own. Spain will lose a lot of family tourism if they insist on this with the 12 year olds, there should be some leeway. If they have had their first jab, at least they are showing as willing to be vaccinated?

It may change later in the year, as you say it does not seem to make sense for children who cannot be vaccinated. Different if people are refusing the vaccine. I imagine Turkey is getting getting a lot of summer holiday bookings!

Aitch.

Sorry, but you are wrong about 3 doses. Its 270 days from the last vaccination of a 1/1 dose -Jansen and 2/2 AZ, Moderna or Pfizer. That a booster/3rd jab is required for travel. After that you will need a booster, at the moment.

There are no plans for a 4th jab role out in the UK. There are a few people who have had a 4th jab but they are clinically vunerable and were called in by their doctors. My wife worked on the vaccination programme in a senior role. The deaths are nowhere near 149,000. The deaths were recorded as a covid death were within 28 days of anyone having a postive test. Which was nonsense as people who died of a heart attack etc but had tested postive within 28 days were recorded as a covid death. Now after people have looked into this, They actually state daily : X amount of people have died within the last 28 days of a postive test, but add they may not have died of covid. So why is anyone who has died of something else still being recorded in the covid figures, even if they have had a postive test. Theres no doubt if you get covid badly, it is a very horrible virus, but far more have recovered and many only had a milder illness. More are going to die from heart disease and cancer, through no diagnosis or treatment.

Hi, yes your right that it is two doses if the last was within 270 days. The vast majority of people who want their 3rd booster dose in the UK have had 3 doses by now so it's not an issue for adults, but it is for children.

If you read my post you will see that I also said there are no plans for a rollout of a 4th dose, so basically the same as you are saying.

The 149,000 figure is the number given for excess deaths since the covid outbreak started.  The number of covid deaths within 28 days of a positive test are reported as 155,698 (as of 30 Jan). I was quoting the lower figure to show that saying there were only 17,000 deaths caused by covid was clearly ridiculous. I would agree with you that the figures seem overstated, i.e. the lower number of excess deaths versus covid deaths needs to be explained.

I think what they are saying that though someone may have died with another ailment covid accelerated that death. In any event there are 149,000 excess deaths but I am sure there will be no end of argument about how accurate the numbers are.

 Does you wife working on the vaccination program give her insight into the hospitalisations and deaths from covid?

Aitch.

Third jab is showing on the NHS App along with the previous 2 

Aitch, she does get a lot of data, not so much on hospitalisations as that is managed by the Trusts.There is quite a disparity in the areas in the country. Deaths are just that deaths recorded as they must be. However the government passed a law that it wasn't just doctors who could sign a death certificate. I know from a friend whose mother died from pancreatic cancer at home, the doctor was going to put covid on the certifcate and my friend and her 2 brothers went mad about it, told the doctor(in this case) that her mother hadn't even been tested for covid. He then agreed to put Pancreatic cancer that she had been suffering with for several months. It was terrible.

I think under pressure it was easier to put covid in some cases for certain doctors and staff.

Her programme of work was the vaccination role out across England, so she get lots of data about all of that. Of course she does hear things from other colleagues across the NHS. It's muted that maybe the covid vaccine could be included in the flu jab. Flu after all is a corona virus as is the common cold.  The biggest problem is there is no joined up approach across diferent countries even within the EU.  Everyone doing their own things is not helpful.

The UK government website has been updated to reflect the new Spanish entry requirements that come into effect from today for UK citizens.

https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/spain/entry-requirements

Quote from the website:

• From 1 February onwards, at least 14 days must have passed since being fully vaccinated (with both doses of a 2-dose vaccine or one dose of a single-dose vaccine) before arrival in Spain. Your date(s) of vaccination must be specified and your final dose must have been administered within 270 days prior to travel to Spain. If you completed your vaccination (with both doses of a 2-dose vaccine or one dose of a single-dose vaccine) more than 270 days prior to travel to Spain, you must be able to show proof of having receiving a booster jab.

01/02/2022 From Belgium to Spain the requirement is a negative PCR test certificate.