It is still “too early to say” whether the reopening of indoor hospitality can take place on May 17th, according to the Environment Minister. George Eustice told Andrew Marr on the BBC that while Britain’s vaccine rollout is “on track” (with 10 million second doses expected to have been administered by the end of the weekend), the risk of Covid variants could delay the next step in the Government’s “roadmap” out of lockdown. He is quoted on the Guardian website:
Well, it is too early to say. But I think we are on track in the sense that we are on track with the rollout of the vaccination programme. We have now vaccinated everybody over the age of 50 and this week they are offering vaccinations as well to those under the age of 50, starting with the 45-to-59 year-olds – so that bit is on track.
But we are being a bit cautious here. So although we have now got 60% of the adult population vaccinated we do just have to keep a close eye on these variants of concern.
Also, see what the impacts are of the easements we have just made, the loosenings we have just made, before moving to the next stage.
He delivered a similar message to Sophy Ridge on Sky News:
The biggest threat to everything we’re doing at the moment is that at some point there will be a variant that manages to evade the vaccine or largely evade it, so it is high on our concerns which is why while the vaccine rollout has been incredibly successful with over 60% of the adult population now vaccinated, we continue to proceed with some caution as we come out of lockdown.
The impact of the partial easing of lockdown earlier this month has been tempered by the weather (of course!) and by the fact that a “large proportion” of hospitality businesses do not have access to sufficient outdoor space. Kate Nicholls, the Chief Executive of UK Hospitality, said that even those venues which were able to reopen outdoors “still aren’t going to break even… the best they are going to achieve outdoors is 20%”, highlighting the need to allow businesses to open fully – that is, indoors.
Imperial College’s Danny Altmann said on Friday that “we should be terribly concerned” about the emergence of the Indian Covid variant in Britain, which could “scupper” the “roadmap” out of lockdown – a statement which a member of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) says is “pessimistic“. The Evening Standard reported:
Imported coronavirus variants are unlikely to set lockdown easing back to “square one” because immunity from vaccines “won’t just disappear”, according to a key figure on the UK’s immunisation committee.
Professor Adam Finn, a member of the JCVI, said he expected a “gradual erosion” of vaccine protection as the virus evolves but not enough to “scupper” the Prime Minister’s roadmap, as one leading scientist had predicted.
Meanwhile, Covid cases have fallen to a seven-month low in England.
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The script is so obvious : the intention is to keep hold of the power generated by Fear.
Of course, the inconsistencies are plain to see for those who aren’t scared into imagining the Emporer’s clothes : leaky ‘vaccines’ moving from centre stage to the periphery; measures with absolutely no evidential foundation being promoted with renewed vigour, despite the mountainous evidence of their futility.
… and then this : the manufacture of fictionally dangerous ‘variants’.
Double variants?
Triple variants?
Quadruple, you get the idea!!
Well put. When will this shit end…
It won’t.
They’re never going to let us out…
‘We have now vaccinated everybody over the age of 50. Er….?
Indeed. Have they really?
Well I haven’t had it, so no, they haven’t.
Me neither.
Well…must be everyone except us four then. Yes, that must be it.
Five. Moi aussi.
Make that six
Funny thing is, I don’t move in particularly unusual circles ( typical ordinary middle class ) ,and I know at least 8 people who haven’t “accepted the offer” of a jab, and others who had it pretty reluctantly.
Not sure if I believe the uptake stats.
Add another one here plus 2 friends I know who won’t be having it.
Plus me and husband. And the thirty or so over 50s at our SITP.
Nor us two, nor my siblings, nor our two best friends nor my neighbour…that’s another seven plus HoMojo below, so that looks like everyone except us 12.
You.re all the reason lockdown can’t be lifted. (Me too)
Government representatives have normally been so much more careful with their use of language. The figures normally quote the numbers of people who have been “offered the vaccine”. Eustace clearly hadn’t read his script.
No.
There’s me
Na na ne na na.
and me – and my aged ex – and my best buddy – and all her other friends:)
Nor me, nor Mr H, nor my brother, or my parents. Nearly everyone else I know has thrown themselves off that cliff.
I only personally know one other person who has refused the jab however I do know of a lady in her 90s who has refused the second jab. She ended up in hospital having a pacemaker fitted after the first and while all around her think it was coincidental she knows otherwise.
They may have offered everone over 50 the vaccine but that doesn’t mean to say everyone over 50 took up the offer.
I haven’t been offered it. Boo hoo.
Nope, I’m 63 and they haven’t vaxxed me despite being tested in their clutches for three weeks in ITU recently.
Nope!
Not everyone.
They might have offered it, but not everyone has had it.
Speaking personally – oh no they f*ck*n’ haven’t.
Er… Not this over 50 or my OH. I knew they were probably lying about the uptake but this proves it!
I was just pondering again the issue of risk reduction, and the crucial role of absolute risk measurements.
Of course, in focusing on the ‘vaccines’, there is a danger of falling into the trap of thinking that absolute risk reduction figures encapsulate just a feature of these concoctions.
But – relevant to the nonsense in this article – the miniscule figures actually capture a combination of two things : the efficacy of the vaccines, but in the context of the prevalence of the virus. The lower the prevalence, the smaller the risk of coming into contact with the virus in the first place..
Possibly, the more important factor is the latter.
In plain English, the minute ARR figures also show how small is the likelihood of contracting Covid-19. So small as to render any maintenance of NPRs – even if they were effective – as totally absurd.
This ‘pandemic’ that never reached ‘epidemic’ proportions is nowhere to be observed now in any real sense. All the feigned tentativeness is pure bullshit.
Don’t know if you have seen this – based on the data that Pfizer & Moderna supplied and noting that AZ had reported lower efficacy rates and these were based on the original variants and it is now advised I believe that we are not seeing the same rates against the South African variant which is supposedly the one of concern now:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/349638914_Outcome_Reporting_Bias_in_COVID-19_mRNA_Vaccine_Clinical_Trials
So if we are looking at 0.7% ARR (for Pfizer as AZ is being thrown under the bus) to be reduced for new variants then weighing up against the known and unknown risks of the vaccine (those with low platelet counts, existing infections, auto-immune conditions etc) then I can’t see how those with no co-morbidities who can avoid NHS hospitals/care homes need to consider having this. Where have people’s sense of risk calculation disappeared to?
I can’t take anymore of the dishonesty and propaganda.
None of what they’re saying makes any sense, the reasons they’re giving for continued restrictions on our lives aren’t going away.
Covid is endemic, if we Lockdown because of variants then we’re never going to be free because viruses are never going to stop mutating.
We know what happens when you remove restrictions, they’ve done it in Sweden, Florida and Texas, nothing happens, the world doesn’t end, life goes on as normal.
It’s absolutely mental what our government is doing, it’s like they’re possessed by madness
Turning our country into a police state, denying people basic liberty, stopping them from earning a living, denying our children an education and turning people’s lives into nothing more than a tool of the state is all worse than covid. It’s not even close and worse than that, we end up at the same place anyway because covid isn’t going anywhere.
I can’t waste anymore of my life in the UK thinking things will go back to normal.
It’s awful. But what can be done? My friends are all complicit in this shit. I can’t even break these stupid rules.
I’ve gotta leave, I work for a multi national with offices in the US, I have over 12 years experience in a specialized job. I think I could get a work visa and move to the US.
If we’re not back to normal by autumn I’m off, I can’t subject myself or my children to this treatment anymore. It’s incredibly harmful to us all.
Could be worse.
You could be in Ontario, with a never-ending curfew as well…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UGdPsimsZcU
Canada has lost it. In every way. And Doug Ford is helping to pave the way to fascism.
Think I remember Mike Yeardon saying in a podcast that a variant can be one amino acid change…also Sucharit Bhakdi describing variants as a newly born baby – unique yet still recognisably a human being.Just been quoting these guys descriptions to a friend who’s lovely husband has the fear.
Its wicked to frighten people so.
Is it me or are the vax side effect reports starting to build in momentum….?
Here’s one hospitality business that won’t be reopening again anytime soon.
Local Live 17/4/21.
“City pub owners (tenants actually) forced to close after Pandemic (lockdown actually) emptied bank accounts.
(Tenants) of the much loved Village Inn have confirmed they won’t be reopening as they’ve decided to take early retirement as a result of the (lockdown).
Pat and Jim have been the friendly faces greeting punters for the past nine years . . .
Sadly with the financial struggle of the Coronovirus ( ? ) they have made the ‘heartbreaking’ decision to retire while they still have some money left.
Pat said ‘we were watching the money draining out of the accounts because of the Coronovirus (? ) so we decided to retire while there was still some money left. . .’ ”
LL report ends.
Might have had a lot more money to retire on if they hadn’t been taken in, with the rest of us, by “Three Weeks To Squash The Sombrero” instead of which they’ve spent 12 months tenancy rent, council tax, wasted stock, topping up furlough payments and getting Covid Safe for a few weeks limited trade last summer and *living out of the till* before finally calling it a day.
Another one bites the dust.
We’ve been looking for a freehold pub to buy for over 2 years now. A steady stream were coming up for sale until about May last year, now all the agents are almost out of stock to sell. Government funding is largely keeping them from the brink, for now. However, when that funding runs out I feel certain we will see a tsunami of businesses failing. They can’t keep them closed or on 20% activity and pay the staff with furlough forever. But which will come first?
Also, a large number of those sold have been sold for redevelopment into housing. So cherish your local pub whilst you can. They have been suffering for years, but now they may well be headed for extinction.
Isn’t the court case, regarding government evidence for keeping indoor hospitality closed, starting tomorrow? Somewhat a coincidence that yet more “deadly” variants have been discovered.
By the government’s own logic we will never be out of lockdown: ZeroCOVID is a nonsensical pipe dream (and they claim they are not following it anyway, although this is debatable), there will always be a reservoir somewhere. And the vaccinations will never keep up with the varients, it’s impossible.
Add these together and there will always always be the risk of a varient, and so lockdown will always, in their minds, be justified.
To be honest if I see the words Imperial College I don’t bother to read the rest because I know it will be a load of drivel.
+1
Too early?
The minister is an innumerate imbecile.
Hospitality was never a driving force behind Covid infections
All hospitality must open irrespective. Mass civil disobedience to end this nonsense.
The biggest threat to everything we’re doing at the moment is that at some point there will be a variant that manages to evade the vaccine or largely evade it, so it is high on our concerns which is why while the vaccine rollout has been incredibly successful with over 60% of the adult population now vaccinated, we continue to proceed with some caution as we come out of lockdown
The only conclusion one can draw from the above is that we will never be fully out of lockdown or allowed to travel abroad again. After all, now that the virus is endemic it is always going to mutate from now until the end of time, it’s what viruses do. Life is full of risk and sadly people die all the time, we just need to accept that and open up.