The U.K. has used just 142 million of the stockpile of 650 million vaccine doses it purchased, leaving an estimated £4 billion worth of vaccines unused and, at current levels of take-up, likely going to waste. The vaccines typically have an expiration date of six to 12 months after manufacture – though it’s not clear how many of the 650 million doses have already been manufactured and put in storage and how many are on order for future manufacture and delivery.
Officials have not revealed exactly how much was paid for the Pfizer vaccines, which comprise nearly a third of the total ordered, but the U.S. Government is reputed to have paid around $20 (£16) a dose.
The Moderna vaccine is said to have cost a bit less, perhaps about $15 (£12) per dose, and the Astra Zeneca considerably less, perhaps as low as $4 (£3) per dose as it was sold at cost. There are no data on the other five types ordered, all of which are as yet completely unused.
If an average price of $10 (£8) per dose is assumed, the total bill for all the unused vaccine doses will amount to around $5 billion or £4 billion. Will the public be forgiving of this massive waste of public funds on account of it occurring with good intentions during a state of emergency? That remains to be seen.
It is however far from the only example of pandemic profligacy. The losses due to fraud and delinquent business loans are colossal, with City AM reporting that the Treasury’s £4.3bn fraud write-off is likely to be eclipsed by £20bn of Covid loan defaults. The Government has also written off £8.7bn it spent on protective equipment bought during the pandemic, with £673m of equipment unusable, £750m not used before its expiry date, £2.6bn of equipment judged to be unsuitable for use in the NHS, and £4.7bn being due to the Government paying more for it during the acute global shortage than it is now worth. The Government also spent £569m buying 20,900 ventilators, of which only 2,150 (10%) were used, the rest being left idle in a Ministry of Defence warehouse.
This gross misuse of taxpayers’ money must be examined in the independent inquiry and by Government so the lessons can be learned and in future a robust management system applied in real time so that even stocks purchased in haste and with urgency are kept in reasonable proportion to anticipated demand.
The over-reaction and panic in spring 2020 resulted in decisions that have now turned out to be a huge waste of public money. If there was perceived to be a shortage of anything that might conceivably be needed to fulfil the needs of the public emergency, the public purse was always open.
Actually, the purse appeared to be treated more like Mary Poppins’ bottomless magic carpet bag, with no sign of any prudent oversight applied to funding decisions as long as they served the purpose of proving to the public that the Government was ‘doing something’ about Covid. The results of that fiscal incontinence are now clear for all to see.
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You need to contextualise the figures you use, which are from the period of heavy fighting during the Battle of Sievierodonetsk. Also, I would seriously question Arakhamia’s outlying figure of 500 per day. If you take that out, it averages 101, which is Reznikov’s number for the fighting during that period – and being the Minister of Defence, he ought to have the best information.
As for Russian deaths, general consensus amongst military types seems to be that one can take 10-20% off Ukraine’s figure of 71k, i.e. about 60k (e.g., Justin Bronk suggests this, while nevertheless strongly disputing the claimed numbers of aircraft lost). Given the obvious fact that Putin needed to mobilise a lot of troops (82,000 or possibly many more) to fill the gaps, and they’re no longer able to conduct offensive operations, this seems eminently plausible.
You may be right that 151 per day is too high, although I also gave a reason why it might be too low. As I said, the number of Ukrainian deaths is much harder to estimate.
As to the number of Russian deaths, the CIA estimated 15,000 on 20th July – which is highly consistent with my estimate of 20,000 by 9th September.
The early CIA figure is just one estimate which some consider quite dubious – there have been disagreements over that. Ben Wallace said on 5th September that the figure was 25k (equating to ~32k today), which is still way lower than the Ukrainian government estimate, but I tend to take all third party estimates with considerable scepticism, since it must be extremely difficult to make such estimates without the kind of knowledge that only low-level unit commanders could realistically provide up the chain of command on a day-to-day basis. I don’t imagine either the MoD or the CIA are trying to count the dead using satellite imagery – it’s probably just a collection of educated guessess based on the apparent scale of combat in various parts of the country.
The database compiled by Mediazona and the BBC News Russian service uses a clear and rigorous methodology. Its creators have said it may underestimate the true count by 40–60%. Which would mean total losses for the regular Russian armed forces are around 10,800.
The Economist claims the DPR militia “have faithfully documented their casualties”. Their total losses stand at 3,526.
Losses for the LPR militia and the Wagner mercenaries are harder to estimate. But it seems unlikely they total more than 11,000.
Attempts like those of Mediazona to estimate casualties using publicly available data such as “social media posts by relatives, reports in local media, and statements of the local authorities” would only get a fraction of the true figure, not 2/3rds of it in my opinion.
The Frenchman Paul Valéry said that war was a massacre of people who do not know each other for the benefit of people who know each other but do not massacre each other.
Back in the real world they are likely losing 20.000 a month. At one point the Uke’s were so desperate for men they conscripted women and criminals. They have bled through over 100 K in dead with 2-3x that injured. They outnumber Vlad the Droner’s forces by about 5:1 yet still cannot make any appreciable gains. If Vlad the PecFlexer’s forces were fully deployed, the Uke’s would be shattered in 2 months. Not even the endless American billions/trillions to the corrupt regime will save them. If the 2nd coming of Chinghis Khan fought like the Americans, the entire Uketopia would be rubble from endless carpet bombing the width and breadth of the country. Criminal xi Biden the election thieving money laundering pedo would have already declared victory on an aircraft carrrier off of San Diego. The Uke’s should be happy the Russians don’t fight like the criminal Americans.
“Run off pharma troll for stab #12 and hopefully you can contract myocarditis or similar and then tell us it was the too-many-eggs-syndrome-nothing to do with the stabs. I hear from the speed of science people, that Stab 17 is the real game changer. Just hang on for that.”
Why don’t you run along and do the same, you nasty piece of sh*t!
What is the point of this speculation. The answer in all cases is too many.
What I have read in alt-media streams is the UKrs have lost 100k dead, 2-3 time wounded.
The 300k currently being injected from RUS are actually being assigned in the main to roles not in the UKr theatre. Non-Theatre active RUS combat troops are being transferred (once replaced ) into the UKr theatre. Reason for this is in 2019, RUS went volunteer-only (non-conscript) and there was a deficit between out-going and in-coming resources.
Another issue probably lost….is who is operating all this latest NATO tech we have sent the Ukr? Because it cant be the UKrs given they have no training or familiarity and active fighting at the same time? How many loved ones in NATO countries are receiving that door-knock stating their husbands and sons were killed in a training accident? We dont here that at all.
I aint picking sides. Im trying to balance competing competent reports from the West and the alt-media. If UKr was kicking RUS butts, why so much equipment (Billions), and why the request for more? Dont make sense? I strongly suspect what we are being told is 180 from the real truth?
Reports I have read indicate that 80,000 of the recent intake have already been embedded with existing front line units throughout Ukraine . It is speculation on my part that these troops are replacing ones who left at the end of their 6 month extended contract.
It makes sense to mix new and experienced troops so that the new troops can benefit from the front-line experience of their compatriots.
Who is operating all the NATO tech? I suspect NATO troops..that’s why it’s not beyond the realms of possibility that the UK really were operating the drones used in the Black Sea…
As you say, it’s hard to train people up quickly for these things….
As to how many troops, a few weeks ago I think it was the Washington Post said for every one Russian soldier killed or injured, five Ukrainian soldiers were killed or injured…..so a lot.
About two months ago Antony Blinken and LLoyd Austin went to Ukraine and vowed to “fight Russia to the last Ukrainian”…..I think we can safely say that to gain their own ends, they’ll also keep going to the last European as well…..
It concerns me when individuals use their status when they make personal comments. It is fair enough that the author of the piece identifies himself as the author, but when someone who happens to be an administrator identifies himself as such, when making comments that are nothing to do with administration, then I judge this as trying to gain some false authority for their view.
My guess is that it’s an automatic feature of the software they use to build and maintain the site.
Exactly. But it’s a fair point, and I’ll see if I can change it.
Thank you, Ian.
That was my suspicion too, however nothing stops someone setting up a private account. It is not even that payment is mandatory before comments are permitted
So both sides are underestimating their losses and overestimating the losses of their opponents. Gosh, who would have guessed that!!