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LONDON, DECEMBER 14 (BUS): Long queues formed on Monday at vaccination centers across England as people responded to the government’s call for all adults to get booster doses to protect themselves from the omicron variant, as the UK recorded its first patient death. Infected with omicron.
In a televised announcement late Sunday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said everyone 18 and older would be offered a third dose of the vaccine by December 31 — less than three weeks, and a month earlier than the previous target, the Associated Press reported. .
Johnson said the boosters would “strengthen our vaccine firewall” against “the expected tidal wave from Omicron”.
UK health authorities say Omicron’s cases are doubling every two to three days in Britain, and that the variant will replace Delta as the dominant coronavirus strain within days. Health Minister Sajid Javid told lawmakers on Monday that Omicron would be dominant in London “within 48 hours”.
While Omicron is acknowledged to be more transmissible than previous variants of the coronavirus, it is unclear how strong it will be and whether the expected wave of infection will engulf the state-funded health care system.
Almost two weeks after its discovery in South Africa, 10 people in British hospitals have COVID-19 linked to Omicron. The British government raised the country’s coronavirus threat level on Sunday, warning that the rapid spread of omicron “adds an additional and rapidly increasing risk to health and public services”.
Scientists in South Africa say the variant may cause less serious disease than the delta variant, but caution that it is too soon to be certain. Health authorities around the world are watching Britain closely to see what the Omicron rush looks like in a country with an older and more immunized population than South Africa.
“The idea that this is a milder version of the virus, I think is something we need to put to one side and just get to know the phenomenal speed with which it is accelerating through the population,” Johnson said while visiting a vaccination center in London. . “So the best thing we can do is get our boosters.”
The UK’s Health Security Agency says current vaccines appear to be less effective at preventing cross-infections in people exposed to Omicron, although this efficacy appears to rise to between 70 per cent and 75 per cent after a third dose.
More than 80 per cent of people aged 12 and over in Britain received two doses of the vaccine, and 40 per cent of adults received three doses. But accelerating the booster program would be a major challenge, requiring nearly 1 million doses given each day — more than the previous high of about 850,000 doses per day. About 750 soldiers and thousands of vaccination volunteers will be recruited to administer vaccines in doctors’ offices, hospitals, pharmacies and temporary vaccination centers.
Many routine measures will be postponed as Britain’s National Health Service swings on high alert for boosters.
While the online booster appointment system won’t be open for those under 30 until Wednesday, adults can – and they did – show up at walking centers to get the boost starting Monday.
At St Thomas’ Hospital, on London’s south bank of the River Thames, rows of people waiting for reinforced shots stretched across Westminster Bridge towards Parliament. At the Gordon Hospital clinic in central London, most of the recruits were in their twenties and thirties.
The government appointment-booking site has struggled to keep up with demand, and has also run out of rapid home virus test kits, which have been distributed free of charge to families during the pandemic.
The goal of strengthening the British government on December 31 applies to England. Other parts of the UK – Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – are also expected to speed up their vaccination campaigns.
While omicron is spread around the world, Britain may be particularly affected because it usually has high levels of travel to South Africa. The omicron outbreak is also more visible in Britain because the UK is also a world leader in genomic sequencing, which identifies and tracks new variants.
Researchers in the UK have sequenced about 13.3 per cent of all positive cases, compared to 3.8 per cent in the US, according to GISAID, which promotes rapid sharing of data on COVID-19 and influenza. While Iceland and Denmark have sequenced a greater proportion of their positive cases, the size of the UK’s population and the scale of their outbreaks mean Britain has sequenced many more cases.
This monitoring provided key evidence that Johnson and his top medical officials were used in the decision to tighten pandemic restrictions and ramp up the UK’s vaccination programme.
Johnson’s Conservative government is asking for vaccination certificates to enter nightclubs and reimposing restrictions that were lifted nearly six months ago. Masks must be worn again in most indoor settings, and from Monday people have been urged to work from home if possible.
Many scientists say these measures are unlikely to be enough and call for more stringent measures. But downtown cafes, bars and shops fear the drop in passenger numbers will hurt their business in the usually busy pre-Christmas period.
Johnson faces a major rebellion from unhappy Conservative MPs when Parliament votes on new virus restrictions. The measures are still likely to be passed with the support of the opposition Labor Party.
It remains unclear how severe cases of COVID-19 caused by omicron are, said Robert Reed, professor of infectious diseases at the University of Southampton, but “the omicron would probably require much larger amounts of antibodies in the blood in order to thwart the virus as much as possible.” “
“We need to give these third doses to as many adults as possible, just in case this virus turns into a raging bull and not a cat pussy,” Reed told LBC radio.
MI