A reader has been in touch to tell us that a Covid certification scheme has been introduced at Durham University, where her son is a first-year student. As she asks, is this even legal?
Elder son, First Year student at Durham University, returned on Sunday for summer term. He has been told he needs to do two lateral flow tests per week and must have a negative email confirmation on his phone in order to do “any university activity”. This means that if he wants to participate in the life of the university, as opposed to stay cooped up in his tiny dorm room 24/7, Covid testing is mandatory.
Is this even legal?
He was also told his term has also been extended by one week, into early July, for the “wider university experience”. (Joke.) Is this so the university can broaden its new scheme to include evidence students have been vaccinated in time for when the roll out hits 18 to 30 year-olds? Presumably, the authorities at Durham don’t care that the risks of getting vaccinated outweigh the risks of not being vaccinated for people in his age group.
This academic year he will have had zero face-to-face teaching. There has been no announcement at all about the 2021/22 academic year teaching arrangements, apart from to confirm that maximum fees will be charges, as they were this year. But of course.
I cannot understand why universities, with all their fine minds, are supporting this nonsensical testing regime. Don’t the medical professors read the data on the false positive rates for lateral flow tests? To me, universities have been complicit in damaging UK further education, as well as the health of their communities.
My poor 19 year-old son is desperate to have a more “normal” life again. He could very easily be coerced into doing almost anything to achieve that and will get vaccinated if it means he can get back to university sport and some socialising. This is the second year of woeful education for him, having had his A-levels cancelled in 2020. It fills me with despair.
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Why do universities go along with this nonsense, even increasing it?
Look at who funds them.
Mostly parents who have no idea how radical they’ve become.
Surprise surprise !
Up pops Mr Vaccine himself yet again.
https://www.gatesfoundation.org/about/committed-grants?q=Durham%20University%20United%20Kingdom
Most of my colleagues in primary care picked up a box of innova LFT s several months ago. There was some inital enthusiasm from the Covid disciples however it has waned in the last few weeks. Nobody checks . Twice a week became once and I know one of my colleagues who in other ways is a signed up cult member hasn’t done one for a couple of months.
I even know some doctors who open the packet and record the number on line as negative without even bothering to do a test. The government have bought billions of pounds of this junk test and they need to get rid of them.
I’m a frequent flyer in terms of medical care – and Covid hasn’t soured me about the excellent personal care that I’ve received.
But, right from the get-go of this shamdemic, I’ve been struck by how many highly competent medical professionals have an almost total ignorance of most aspects of SARS-CoV-2. The uselessness of masks isn’t understood; GP surgeries have been barricaded as if it was Ebola on the march; there seems to be no knowledge of the real-world prevalence or impact; comments on well known facts about the fallacies around PCR testing and the significance of Ct levels are met with blank looks. The difference between relative and absolute risk figures …. Uh?
What are your insights into this phenomenon, Peter – given the lengthy amount of training that goes into the making of a medical professional? I’d be quite startled if a plumber looked blank if I asked about – say – the reliability of different materials used for piping or the possibility of a failure in a boiler.
Is it all down to group-think and fear of authority?
You don’t get into medical school by being a free thinker . Most doctors automatically follow the social, cultural and political fashions.
Yes, along the lines of my comment below I think this has been a worrying trend in many areas where our future survival depends on our ability to innovate, validate, make the right decisions.
It will be the practise managers that turn Surgery premises into WW2 bunkers; one in one out via the one way system at entrance, seating rearranged with alternate chairs taped off, childrens play area ‘out of bounds’.
I had 3 GP appointments two months ago, Doctors and Nursing staff used the basic blue/white masks but reception and ancillary staff all wore the more substantial ones that make them look like puffins in profile.
Medics little protest perhaps ?
I had a routine screening a few months back, after masks were mandated. I wore my lanyard which I don’t normally bother with. Other than a quick question by the door monitor, nothing further was said. That is the law, not what @gina has been experiencing and reporting on.
My concern is that some places are getting emboldened. Where there is any taste for authoritarianism the perpetrators are getting the message that they can go ahead. This Durham uni thing must also be illegal. Let’s hope some are brave enough to resist and sue.
I had a routine “ know your numbers “ screening due but told them to forget it as I refuse to wear a muzzle like some little china man.
I’m totally disgusted with all this rubbish. To think of the money we have payed in over the years- wasted!
Remember when they wiped down each chair in the surgery when a patient stood up? That has stopped. Almost impossible to transmit the invisible virus on chairs. Airborne transmission. How could they get something so basic so wrong. That is just one example of the insanity that reigns in the COVID narrative. Kiddies in schools wearing masks, and taking COVID tests twice a week. Thanks big pharma and the others who are making our lives as uncomfortable as possible.
Just run water.
There’s no sample type control so it will just give a negative result with a valid control line.
Ye Gods woman, take your son out of the University, don’t pay one more penny, and start getting others to do the same! If they take you to court, who cares, you will have a good case against them. If enough parents do it even better. I’m sorry, but the time for parents to stand up and be counted is now! No one is going to do it for you!
This parent should sue the university. So should all the other parents.
I agree with the sentiment but I’m not sure the parents can sue the university. The universities relationship is with the student so they would have to be the ones who sue. Someone please correct me if I am wrong but that is my understanding.
I’m sure you are right. All the paperwork was signed by our son and he owes the student loan debt, not us. After all they are adults. Just glad he got through university whilst it was still an experience worth having.
I speak from very bitter experience. Complaining about a University is about as effective as complaining to the BBC. My son was abandoned by his, even kicked out by email, and never physically checked upon despite the fact they knew he had mental health issues. They are horrible institutions.
There are relatively very reasonably priced distance learning degrees, with an increasingly wide choice nowadays. Also, it depends a bit what the son is studying but for some careers he may be better off without a degree at all – if I were doing that stage of my life again I wouldn’t bother with uni.
Presumably, the son wants a uni education–you can’t get far without one these days. But why no let him defer for the upcoming year. Take a year off. Of course, he would have to have a reason for this but “mental health issues” as a result of the pandemic is always a good one that it would be hard for the faculty to say refuse without causing a scandal. The truth is that uni education isn’t going to be “back to normal” any time soon so why waste money? On the other hand, dropping out is also a waste of money. Defer for a year, go back in the autumn of 2022.
Absolutely right. They won’t have a leg to stand on. Far better out of this environment anyway.
There are some fine minds at our Universities, but there are many more that are at best, mediocre.
There may be fine minds, but that’s not enough. This madness requires people to have honesty and courage.
Universities don’t have ‘fine minds’. They are peopled by the most bigoted and unenlightened, incapable of open discussion and drinking at the trough of formulaic dissertation. I know, I’ve guested at eight of them including Cambridge. Honourable exceptions of course, but they keep their mouths shut. Students should be refusing to pay their fees. It must be completely illegal to coerce people into taking what is an experimental vaccine. Get a lawyer. .
Unis are full of refugees from reality in my 9 years experience of them.
I was at Cambridge over 30 years ago and get the college and uni alumni magazine regularly. I’m disgusted by how politically correct they are. Things were bad when I was there, but it’s far worse now. My daughter’s there and tells me about it.
Just watch the mission creep on this.
What a despicable place such a once famous University has sunk to.
I would take my son out of that place and cancel all fees,. This cannot be legal, it is tantamount to blackmail…
This is the world that the evil bastards have created, quite deliberately. Whether or not the govt themselves introduce any laws or rules mandating vaccines, organisations and groups everywhere will do their work for them, and if it’s not explicit it will be done using social pressure. Some close to me has been shut out of an activity by vaccine fascists. When it’s at a social level, there’s almost no point in fighting it because why would you want to spend time with vaccine fascists?
I agree with your last point but I think if I was in the parent’s place I would fight this. Universities don’t like to be threatened by legal action and any accusation of discrimination would not look good, especially if it is made public. The university is abusing its position and threatening the well being of its students. There is an obvious danger that some students will be driven to self harm or suicide. What about involving NUS and student welfare services? This needs to be a joint effort between parents and students to face down the university authorities using the threat of withholding tuition fees, or else there will be no end to this tyranny.
Yes, I agree, one should push back with every means at one’s disposal against any organisation trying it on.
I recently had to deal with some mask fascism, complained more in hope than expectation to the relevant party in “authority” and got an extremely favourable response. It’s always worth a try.
This is beyond disgusting.
Students need to withhold fees and boycott classes.
The HE sector has been dismal in all this, where it should have been leading the resistance against witchcraft in favour of analysis and science.
Tell the poor bugger to play along with it by dipping the swab in a can of Coke and keep a video record to show it the powers that be once he graduates.
But then how does he get the email on his phone? (If he even has a phone, I’m considering denying I own one).
Most of the university will just be recording a negative without even licking the test. Straight in the bin, negative. Get on with life.
“I cannot understand why universities, with all their fine minds, are supporting this nonsensical testing regime. Don’t the medical professors read the data on the false positive rates for lateral flow tests? ”
They’re doing it because they can, and because at heart they’re radical Left totalitarian fascists.
Stop funding them. Universities are rapidly becoming nothing more than communist indoctrination centres. Don’t send your children there. The universities don’t care about the students, only about the money they can bring in, and in brainwashing them.
“.. at heart they’re radical Left totalitarian fascists …Universities are rapidly becoming nothing more than communist indoctrination centres.”
Sorry – but reverse barminess based on parading generalised nonsense woven around old prejudices is no answer to the issues we’re facing.
If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, chances are it is in fact a duck. Generally. I would say woke rather than communist though.
I think what we are facing is a new authoritarian beast which is the sum total of the worst parts of all ideologies (the ones that are profitable at least)
Yes!
All students in Cambridge were tested (over 19,000 I believe). Not a single one tested positive (after a small number of the group tests returned +ve, none of the individual tests did). What a waste of time and money!!
No the money isn’t wasted, it’s being given to exactly the right people (for their definition of right)
Several US universities have mandated vaccination for all students attending in September (the beginning of our Fall term). More schools will be announcing the same. It will come as a surprise if any significant movement against this is organized. Almost everyone has lost his mind, so won’t question or protest.
“I cannot understand why universities, with all their fine minds, are supporting this nonsensical testing regime.”
You know why, we all know why. Because they are lead by people who think their bread is best buttered by helping impose a totallitarian state. Because they believe they know what is best for others and they like domination of thought, action and speech. Behind much I also suspect is Chinese money being used to undermine the West.
If the above sounds mad and you can be bothered start following the money.
There are two traits that a lot of modern people have but particularly the ‘educated’:
1) they are obedient and biddable in the extreme,
2) they are entirely sure that humanity now collectively fully understands the world around it and that it must act in accordance with that assumed knowledge to control all that it ‘knows’.
This makes them suckers for those who pull the purse strings of influential people and institutions.
Looks like this article has become quite a focus for generalized prejudice and bollocks.
Who’s bribing the universities? Which ignorant unprincipled numpty is in charge of Durham?
This is medical terrorism, and not worthy of any ethical organisation.
A few decades back, no university cared where you lived or whether you even turned up for lectures, although if you’d gone awol for the exams you weren’t going to pass.
It’s all about the money, money, money…..
I’m sure you can guess. All roads lead to that generous philanthropist:-
https://www.gatesfoundation.org/about/committed-grants?q=Durham%20University%20United%20Kingdom
This is pure insanity. The young generation of this country have been treated with total and utter contempt; it is a total disgrace. And it is not just those at university, it is the entire younger generation who have been made to suffer.
The politicians and SAGE scientists MUST be held to account for the dire consequences of their actions on the young generation of this country.
It is quite simply willful negligence of the highest order by those that are controlling the Covid narrative.
Shame on them, shame on them.
Why do the students go along with it? I always thought there was more important things in life than good exam results, status and making a lot of money. As an engineer I felt frustrated those selecting new engineers and technicians seemed to put so much emphasis on good exam results and ambition; the engineers and technicians I found most useful were not the ones with the best qualifications or grades, but the ones who can figure things out themselves, not afraid to challenge and ask questions, a genuine interest in engineering. The last few decades to me seem to have been a trend away from the latter towards the former.
Couldn’t agree more, MechEng. I know someone who didn’t go to grammar school or university but is the best engineer I have ever come across. His enquiring mind and passion for inventiveness is second to none.
My husband was a marine engineer for most of his working life. Since retirement he’s become the ‘go to’ man for fixing just about everything for our neighbours. I’ve never known him fail to bring anything mechanical back to life – in fact he’s mechanic, electrician, plumber, generally a jack-of-all-trades, master of them all.
For a few years after leaving the sea he worked in the engineering dept of a large factory. He was amazed yet amused at the number of young ‘whippersnappers’ who arrived from university armed with their engineering degrees but were quite clueless about real, hands-on engineering and had to be taught by the experts.
You lucky woman! A real man. My father was the same, nothing wasted, pieces of metal, wood, wire, fabric, anything useful stored until a use could be found for it. How many men can successfully put up a shelf nowadays? Most so called professional people cannot manage to do a proper job and have no concept of taking any pride in the result. It’s all about the money even at this end of the scale.
It will not be teaching staff who are mandating testing anymore than they concern themselves with students living arrangements. Universities are not run by academics with fine minds but by professional managers.
The academics go along with it. Corrupted minds.
That term is an insult to those who are managing professionally in the commercial world. Most ‘managers’ in universities couldn’t get a job in the real world so end up screwing up lives in the low risk, low challenge FE environment. See also NHS ‘managers’
This is the policy on their website. https://www.dur.ac.uk/coronavirus/students/wse/
If I were a prospective student reading this rubbish I’d put off starting until 2023 and choose a different Uni!
It’s been a while but I had a wee trawl through the Public Health Scotland data yesterday for figures up to April 24th from start of recording tests/deaths. It literally made me want to go and lie in front of a bus. In Scotland in the 15-24 age group we have seen only 15,140 confirmed cases and no deaths. None.
So WTF are the government/universities/colleges/schools playing at with this utter pish? Constant testing, mounting pressure to be vaccinated… I’m actually kinda sad that the country started opening up on Monday as now I have fewer excuses for not going out and interacting with the complete idiots who seem to think this kind of nonsense is OK.
This should have read 15 – 19 age group. My bad. Although adding in 20 – 24 age group gives around an extra 21,000+ results and sadly 3 recorded deaths. To put that in perspective – there were 106 suicides in those age groups in 2019.
Do drop the ‘sadlidied’ nonsense. People die all the time. Fact. How many young people. in Scotland died from other causes during the same period? Weren’t their deaths sad? Let’s play with figures,if we must, but without claptrap.
Sorry Annie,
I thought the “sadlidied” remark was to take the mickey out of those who were denying that people die as a normal thing?
All students should refuse to return next academic year ( and refuse to pay any fees). I’d like to see how these f*ckwits cope with no income. Sadly, I expect most will roll up their sleeves and take ‘the jab ‘ out of fear for their future employability.
“Universities with all their fine minds”.
I have to say, much of what passes for science these days strikes me as little more than advanced fantasising. Some of these people are simply very good at arguing for what they already believe.
Yes there are some excellent academics but they are outnumbered by the mediocre types who use their cleverness to devise experiments to prove what they already decided to believe or what their sponsors require
Why are parents even sending their children to university. The wasted time and money could surely be better spent in learning a real skill. Get your child interested in the wider world. In the future you g adults will be indoctrinated to follow the state and denounce their parents and family. Do we want this for the future. Let’s take action as parents and boycott Universities. Let’s take our children back and let them build their own independent future.
if parents do not act now, they cannot blame their children for creating a communist state. Wake up, stop complaining, get active.
So these aren’t even the self-reported tests? Where do they go to get tested and who is paying for all of it?
If they wanted to save student lives or even just improve their health I’m sure there’s many other things that would be a better idea!
The people running the universities so not have fine minds (ref the article) – they are morons and imbeciles who think that they are clever.
Shun and despise them. Do not go along with their pressures. They have lied about so many things such as face-to-face teaching, ripped of students and lined their pockets.
Sounds a bit like the NHS. You pay for a service you don’t get yet have no choice about paying for it.
As mentioned by others your son has signed a contract with Durham. Unless that contract specified that medical procedures could be enforced then there is a case for breach of contract. As suggested by many other contributors, a lawyer should be contacted asap. They should be very happy to run a class action suit
If this had happened decades ago when I was a student, there would have been uproar among students and protests galore. Not now. Just resigned passivity. Very sad what’s happened to our young adults.
This makes me sick to my stomache. Where are the medics? Why would this age group be vaccinated? A 99.9% survival if they get COVID. Unethical, medical negligence, if not criminal negligence. Where are the flipping lawyers representing the youth of this country who are also the future of this country? Just one more lie from your incompetent government. After six months of lockdown which you were told would end in June. Here is evidence it will not. Please stand up for your children. Their lives are being ruined by this ongoing nonsense.
If it was only a 99.9% survival rate that would actually be quite concerning. It’s far far higher than that for student-age young people
When you realise its nothing to do with our health but for control with the ultimate control of being microchipped it all falls into place. So the question is do you really want you or your family to be tagged like a domestic animal or live as a free person. Time is running out.
Its the youth of today I feel for. When I think of the freedom I had in the 60s and early 70s as a teenager, I can’t imagine life as a teen today with so many restrictions. Their mental health must surely be greatly affected. All part of this ‘plandemic ‘ to weaken the minds and the resolve of the populace through fear and brainwashing.
I think the deliberate dumbing down and brainwashing of young people began long ago, but has been ramping up in recent years, and is now at warp speed. Not even any attempt to disguise it now.
My daughter is a first year at Durham and is quite happy to go along with this. IOn the grounds that if she’s happy, so am I it really is quite acceptable. Students have been let down very badly by their Universities and the Government and anything that allows them to have some sort of normal life should be welcomed. As for the extra week, it’s rent free and hopefully is just about those students having a great end to their term. Don’t read too much into the offer which Durham didn’t have to make.
What about all those students who aren’t happy? Where do you draw the line – certificates to go to a concert, certificates to go to a pub or restaurant, or being stopped in the street and asked for your certificate?
The parents are responsible. If they do nothing about it, then what can they expect.
Martin Lewis do you have a right to a tuition fee refund if your course is now being taught online?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmXQxT4zJWk
.
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/students/student-loans-tuition-fees-changes/
We are much closer to the world of Orwell’s 1984 than people think. The loss of free and rational pretty much all of our national and cultural institutions is the transparent evidence for this. Truth is the victim, and I am afraid I see no grounds for optimism for the future. The West is lost.
There must be a legal challenge to this nonsense surely? Perhaps the young might consider not going to these woke and politically correct universities but joining the far better university of life. Most of the degress obtainable from these institutions are very second rate nowadays and hardly prepare one for the real world or work in any event and just leave the student with huge debts and no job.
It’s against the Nuremberg Code Article 6 and the 2005 UNESCO statement on bioethics and human rights. No one may be coerced into having a medical intervention, which both the vaccine and testing are. Also, the GMC also state “doctors must… share relevant information about the benefits and harms of proposed options and reasonable alternatives, including the option to take no action”, but as the stage 3 testing for vaccines hasn’t been completed (not until next year), no doctor has and so cannot give all the ‘relevant information’, particularly medium to long term effects. This may also help: https://dailysceptic.org/2021/04/27/the-uk-currently-operates-a-system-of-informed-consent-for-vaccinations-currently-minister/
hope you can take him out of the university before he’s intimidated into getting ‘vaccine ‘ and invasive ‘ tests’
whats maddening to me is that my nephews are totally brainwashed believers in the new religion so is another young friend who said all her friends too cant wait to get the ‘vaccine
Effect on children including young adults.
Back in March last yeas was an interview with a Korean COVID-19 expert and as well as the assertions that China controlled this well with strong restrictions there is this answer about education.
Stephen Park (Interviewer): “In Korea the start of the school is being postponed, people are practicing social distancing, and the government even sends regular updates via texts. How well do you think this is all being handled?”
Professor Kim Woo-joo “On March 20th, a couple days ago, the prime minister made a special announcement that he strongly recommends social distancing. So religious facilities, places people hang out, like bars, and indoor gyms… From march 20 for 2 weeks, these 3 types of places were strongly recommended to shut down. But this is not mandatory. People who are over 50 or 60 are following these protocols well. But teens and those in their 20s are not, because for teens in Korea, their education is very important. Even if they are sick and have a fever, they have to go to school and academy. The school year was postponed for elementary, middle, and high school because of COVID-19, but in the evening kids go to academies. So even if the government pushed back school, kids will still go to academy to study at night. Since I checked last weekend 90% of academies are open. In Asia, the college you go to determines your future.”
So not only did the kids continue their education, even when infected, but they were taught, presumably by someone much older!!!