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Post by zenfootball2 on Apr 19, 2020 13:35:27 GMT 1
All these questions about who did what etc pale into insignificance when you consider the fact pointed out by scientist working on finding a vaccine. He was interviewed on Sky News this morning and cautioned us, that yes they are working on a vaccine but that no one has as yet ever managed to produce a vaccine for a covid type virus. true and worth bearing in mind they have been trying since the SARS pandemic in 2004 |
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Post by zenfootball2 on Apr 19, 2020 13:38:08 GMT 1
www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/19/michael-gove-fails-to-deny-pm-missed-five-coronavirus-cobra-meetingsMichael Gove has declined to deny that Boris Johnson missed five consecutive emergency meetings in the build-up to the coronavirus crisis, or that the UK shipped protective equipment to China in February, as the government faced intense pressure over its response to the pandemic. Pressed on a series of allegations about delays and failings as the virus started to spread from China, detailed in the Sunday Times, Gove said that some elements of the story were “slightly off-beam”, but repeatedly declined to say which. Speaking after Gove on Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday show, Labour’s Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, said he had given “possibly the weakest rebuttal of a detailed expose in British political history”. Ridge asked Gove, who holds the cabinet role of chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster, three times whether it was true the UK sent hundreds of thousands of items of personal protective equipment (PPE) to China during February. A shortage of PPE for NHS and care home staff has been a repeated criticism of the UK response to coronavirus, with the Guardian revealing on Friday that NHS staff had been told to wear plastic aprons if stocks of protective gowns ran out. Asked about this, Gove said: “There are one or two aspects of the Sunday Times report that are slightly off-beam, but the most important thing to stress is that the fight against the coronavirus is an international effort.” Asked what was incorrect about the story, Gove said: “I won’t go through, here, a point-by-point rebuttal of all the things in the Sunday Times story that are a little bit off-beam, but that will be done later.” Gove was also asked about the claim in the Sunday Times that Johnson missed five meetings of the government’s Cobra emergency committee during a period in February where he spent an entire parliamentary recess out of sight at his official country retreat of Chequers. Prime ministers do not always chair Cobra meetings, but generally do during a crisis. The Sunday Times quoted one unnamed senior adviser as saying Johnson “didn’t work weekends”, and “there was a real sense that he didn’t do urgent crisis planning”. Gove rejected the charge of a lack of leadership, but did not explicitly deny that Johnson had missed the Cobra meetings. whilst britain has an international duty to help it also has a duty to look after its own citizens. china through chinese companys whent on global buying spree shipping tons of PPE from all over the world in early february. whilst Boris missed a number of crucial meetings i presume key goverment ministers and health advisors were at these meetings and what recomendations did they make ? |
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Post by zenfootball2 on Apr 19, 2020 14:22:22 GMT 1
Sir Jeremy James Farrar OBE FRCP FRS FMedSci is a British medical researcher who since 2013 has been director of the Wellcome Trust. He was previously a professor of tropical medicine at the University of Oxford
gave an interview to sophy ridge on sky news who unlike many interviwers gave the person time to anwer the question and did not go for this hectoring tecnique so loved by many these days.
he seems to be a sensible and pragmatic person who certantly seems to have a better grasp of the issues facing this country than a lot of other people i have seen interviewd.
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Post by stfcfan87 on Apr 19, 2020 14:24:46 GMT 1
The times is famously a left leaning paper of course...
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Post by Deleted on Apr 19, 2020 19:17:23 GMT 1
For those that are taking the Times article as fact should listen to Javid Nawaz on LBC who brings up some very good points. Everyone fighting to make their version of events the one that will be written as history:- Maajid Nawaz (LBC) tried to find the motive behind writing an article filled with half-truths, coming up with an intimidating conclusion. Maajid was referencing an article released by The Sunday Times claiming that the government was slow to act appropriately against the spread of coronavirus and there has been a disconnect between what was recommended by health professionals and what the government were doing. He began by pointing out that from the beginning there was a disconnect between advice given by the World Health Organisation and the true danger of Covid-19. He stated that the "government were following WHO advice which was wrong because of Chinese propaganda". Maajid argued that the government was not only listening to advice, "but listened so much that Boris Johnson ended up in hospital" for being so thorough in his response. Sharing the the point that the changing of method by the government throughout the early stages of the outbreak is normal, Maajid put simply that it was because it is the government's job to "pivot based on new advice" . In what Maajid branded a "blatant and clear hatchet job" by the newspaper, Maajid suggested that there was an ulterior motive to the article being written as a half-truth, as he put on air. "Rupert Murdoch perhaps doesn't support Boris Johnson as Prime Minister" he claimed. Maajid stated that through printing a piece that landed the PM in such hot water it has brought his role as PM into question. He concluded that there is a motive to have another Prime Minister that the media mogul prefers behind the article. |
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Post by stfcfan87 on Apr 19, 2020 20:38:16 GMT 1
So the Murdoch press have changed their minds on supporting Boris then, having wanted him to win the leadership contest and the election??
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Post by thesensationaljt on Apr 20, 2020 11:32:06 GMT 1
We went shopping in Newtown this morning. Printed below is a true conversation I had with a member of staff. jaytee : Excuse me, can you tell me where the corned beef is? Shop worker : In the tin. That was me told.  |
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Post by northwestman on Apr 20, 2020 12:01:05 GMT 1
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8234907/Hospitals-set-run-gowns-TOMORROW-NHS-death-toll-hits-80.htmlMinisters face fresh fury today as a vital shipment of coronavirus protective kit from Turkey looks set to be delayed again - with medics warning they might be forced to stop treating patients. Hospitals are on the verge of running out of some life-saving supplies after the 84-tonne delivery, including 400,000 protective gowns, failed to arrive last night. Medical bodies say shortages mean doctors could need to make 'difficult decisions' between exposing themselves to the virus or 'letting a patient die on their watch'. Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick announced with fanfare on Saturday that the consignment was coming, before Education Secretary Gavin Williams humiliatingly admitted last night that it had been postponed. Mr Williamson said he 'hoped' it would be in the UK today, while Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden predicted this morning that it will leave Turkey today. However, Chris Hopson, chief of NHS Providers, which represents hospital trusts, said this morning there was 'low confidence' the materials will actually arrive. 'As of an hour ago there is relatively low confidence it will arrive today. If it is going to arrive today is will probably arrive late in the day,' he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. He accused ministers of raising the hopes of health staff saying they had 'bitter experience' of promised PPE either failing to arrive, or turning out to be either faulty or the wrong kit. Hospital bosses have slammed the government over shortage of PPE amid warnings trusts may run out of protective gowns today as medics threaten to stop treating coronavirus patients over fears for their own safety. Medical bodies say the shortages mean doctors could be forced into a 'difficult decision' between exposing themselves to the virus or 'letting a patient die on their watch'. It comes as the death toll among health workers including frontline NHS staff and care workers hits 80. The shortages have led to a chorus of criticism that those fighting in the frontline against the virus are being betrayed as the Government fails to 'get a grip' on the escalating crisis.
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Post by northwestman on Apr 20, 2020 14:53:21 GMT 1
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8235979/UKs-coronavirus-crisis-peaked-lockdown-Expert-argues-draconian-measures-unnecessary.htmlOne of the best articles on coronavirus I've read, and I've read a few by now! Carl Heneghan, professor of evidence-based medicine at Oxford University, claims data shows infection rates halved after the Government launched a hand-washing drive and recommend people keep two metres apart on March 16. He said ministers 'lost sight' of the evidence and rushed into a nationwide quarantine six days later after being instructed by scientific advisers who have been 'consistently wrong' during the crisis. The peak of deaths occurred on April 8, and if you understand that then you work backwards to find the peak of infections. That would be 21 days before then, right before the point of lockdown.' Professor Heneghan added: 'Fifty per cent reductions in infections occurred on March 16, right when hand washing and social distancing was introduced. ‘People are avoiding going to GPs and hospitals because they believe there is so much infection there that they might catch it [coronavirus]. That’s really damaging.’ Figures show that more than 80 extra deaths are occurring every day in London alone before paramedics reach the victims because patients are reluctant to phone for an ambulance in case they catch the virus in hospital. Professor Heneghan said the decision to abandon mass-testing and contact tracing had 'completely failed' elderly people. 'The shielding has failed - 70 per cent of all the deaths are in the over-75s. Forty per cent of all the nursing homes have the infection. 'So whatever we have done it has completely failed in terms of shielding. Why did the scientific advisers say to abandon mass testing and contact tracing? 'We can see it worked for other countries like Germany and South Korea, so why? 'If it was about resources – look at what Germany did. It devolved responsibility, getting universities and healthcare sites to carry out tests. 'We centralised it. But that was always going to be impossible for 66million people in the UK. 'We have failed the elderly – care home and healthcare workers needed to be tested and isolated.' He said testing small samples of the population and applying the results to the rest of society was a 'really easy' way out of the nationwide quarantine. 'The key is nobody has really understood how many people actually have the infection,' he added. 'You could do that really quickly - random sampling of 1,000 people in London who thought they had the symptoms. 'You could do that in the next couple of days and get a really key handle on that problem and we would then be able to understand coming out of lockdown much quicker. 'In fact the damaging effects now of lockdown are going to outweigh the damaging effects of coronavirus.'
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Post by Worthingshrew on Apr 20, 2020 15:46:04 GMT 1
The public don’t understand that the long term fatalities from the lockdown are likely to far outweigh the immediate deaths from CV, 8ncludng any second spike. People will be dying in 5,10,15 and 20 years time as a result of cancer scans missed during lockdown, or treatments delayed, not to mention the health effects of the economic catastrophe we will experience. However Boris won’t be around as PM to have these counted against him.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2020 15:50:26 GMT 1
The public don’t understand that the long term fatalities from the lockdown are likely to far outweigh the immediate deaths from CV, 8ncludng any second spike. People will be dying in 5,10,15 and 20 years time as a result of cancer scans missed during lockdown, or treatments delayed, not to mention the health effects of the economic catastrophe we will experience. However Boris won’t be around as PM to have these counted against him. What effect is this virus having on A&E attendances, which will highlight 2 things to me. 1 a lot of A&E attendances in the first instance are not really Emergencies, and its being used as an instant GP, so abuse of the system 2 The high percentages are due to social life and evening entertainment. Both of these are preventable. |
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Post by Worthingshrew on Apr 20, 2020 16:21:57 GMT 1
I think you’re right about both of these, there has been a steady rise in inappropriate use of A&E for a long time. This is a different issue to the rise in non-Covid deaths though.
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Post by zenfootball2 on Apr 20, 2020 18:00:25 GMT 1
www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/14/how-greece-is-beating-coronavirus-despite-a-decade-of-debtso a country still on its knees economicaly , acted quickly with there lockdown,all incoming flights were monitored anyone coming from hot spots were quarantined in hotels. and they used technology to reduce contact with GP's with 99 deaths a stagering 20,366 less deaths than italy " Their efforts at keeping the country virus-safe appear to be paying off: in a population of just over 11 million, there were, as of Monday, 2,145 confirmed cases of coronavirus and 99 fatalities, far lower than elsewhere in Europe. Italy to date has registered 20,465 deaths." "The country’s ability to cope with a public health emergency of such proportions was not a given. After almost a decade embroiled in debt crisis – years in which its economy contracted by 26% – Greece’s health system has far from recovered." "Greece, like Italy, also has a large elderly population, with about a quarter of pensionable age. “There were realities, weaknesses, that we were very aware of,” said Dr Andreas Mentis who heads the Hellenic Pasteur Institute. “Before the first case was diagnosed, we had started examining people and isolating them. Incoming flights, especially from China, were monitored. Later, when others began to be repatriated from Spain, for example, we made sure they were quarantined in hotels.” "Alex Patelis, Mitsotakis’ economics adviser, said: “There are problems you can solve through spin and others that require truth and transparency. It was very clear we needed experts and we needed to listen to them." "In late February, before Greece had recorded its first death, carnival parades were cancelled. On 4 March, before most of Europe, schools were ordered closed. Within days, bars, cafes, restaurants, nightclubs, gyms, malls, cinemas, retail stores, museums and archaeological sites were also shuttered." "One of the first things we did to limit the incentives for people to exit their homes was to enable them to receive prescriptions on their phones. That, alone, has saved 250,000 citizens from making visits to the doctor in the space of 20 days. It has dramatically helped reduce the number of people exiting their home, which can only be a good thing.”
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Post by northwestman on Apr 20, 2020 18:51:18 GMT 1
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/20/uk-coronavirus-response-nhs-local-government-care-homes-british-politiciansAt first, Johnson didn’t take Covid-19 seriously, then he changed his mind and his advisers – and put himself in charge. Then he got ill and vanished. Since then, a stage army of second-rate ministers, with a media alternately cheering and jeering, seemed in thrall to one man, Neil Ferguson of Imperial College, whose record of modelling of past epidemics has been criticised. Now, as countries across Europe feel their way to ending lockdown, Britain’s government refuses even to mention the phrase, let alone debate it. A public experiencing immense economic precariousness is considered unfit to be told anything, other than to obey orders of ludicrous joy-suppression. Sitting on a park bench is a police offence. In Britain, no one is in charge. The health secretary, Matt Hancock, is a serial promiser rather than deliverer. He is like a signalman with his wires cut. The chancellor, Rishi Sunak, is clearly not senior enough to win the case for relaxation. The stand-in prime minister, Dominic Raab, intones slogans about “protecting the NHS”. A government that resorts to slogans has lost an argument. There is now a serious functional disconnect between Whitehall on the one hand and the Covid-19 economy on the other. The failures revealed in the 2016 Cygnus report on pandemic preparedness were not acted upon. Sunak’s 80% loan scheme has not worked, because banks were told to shoulder 20% of the risk and many are naturally baling out. It should have been 100%. The furlough subsidies are similarly mired in bureaucracy. Money should have been “printed” and paid into individual bank accounts, not to companies. Most serious has been an apparent collapse in public health beyond the realm of the NHS. From the start of the outbreak, the focus of attention should have been on those already caring for the elderly. Yet for weeks, care homes and home carers were not mentioned and the progress of the virus for them was not monitored. Because they were not “our NHS”, they were not even our dead. The NHS was showered with beds and praise, while its workers were left at home, untested. Local government, which everywhere else in Europe seems to be deeply involved in this emergency, was simply ignored. Equipment was not supplied, money was not spent.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2020 19:27:07 GMT 1
The public don’t understand that the long term fatalities from the lockdown are likely to far outweigh the immediate deaths from CV, 8ncludng any second spike. People will be dying in 5,10,15 and 20 years time as a result of cancer scans missed during lockdown, or treatments delayed, not to mention the health effects of the economic catastrophe we will experience. However Boris won’t be around as PM to have these counted against him. What effect is this virus having on A&E attendances, which will highlight 2 things to me. 1 a lot of A&E attendances in the first instance are not really Emergencies, and its being used as an instant GP, so abuse of the system 2 The high percentages are due to social life and evening entertainment. Both of these are preventable. You've hit the nail right on the head. People treating A&E as an instant GP has been a problem for years. |
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Post by Worthingshrew on Apr 20, 2020 21:37:45 GMT 1
What effect is this virus having on A&E attendances, which will highlight 2 things to me. 1 a lot of A&E attendances in the first instance are not really Emergencies, and its being used as an instant GP, so abuse of the system 2 The high percentages are due to social life and evening entertainment. Both of these are preventable. You've hit the nail right on the head. People treating A&E as an instant GP has been a problem for years. I agree with you, but also related to difficulty increasingly, of being able to get a GP appt under the Tories. |
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Post by ( you know who from b&a ) on Apr 20, 2020 22:11:58 GMT 1
alot of people are not attending A&E for a variety of reasons whereas they normally wouldn't have thought twice about it
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Post by Deleted on Apr 20, 2020 22:30:20 GMT 1
You've hit the nail right on the head. People treating A&E as an instant GP has been a problem for years. I agree with you, but also related to difficulty increasingly, of being able to get a GP appt under the Tories. The problem has been around for years. The issue of a lack of GPs in Primary Care was highlighted in the Lord Darzi report of 2007. This was at the time of a Labour government, just to add some balance to the discussion. |
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Post by stfcfan87 on Apr 20, 2020 23:13:04 GMT 1
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/20/uk-coronavirus-response-nhs-local-government-care-homes-british-politiciansAt first, Johnson didn’t take Covid-19 seriously, then he changed his mind and his advisers – and put himself in charge. Then he got ill and vanished. Since then, a stage army of second-rate ministers, with a media alternately cheering and jeering, seemed in thrall to one man, Neil Ferguson of Imperial College, whose record of modelling of past epidemics has been criticised. Now, as countries across Europe feel their way to ending lockdown, Britain’s government refuses even to mention the phrase, let alone debate it. A public experiencing immense economic precariousness is considered unfit to be told anything, other than to obey orders of ludicrous joy-suppression. Sitting on a park bench is a police offence. In Britain, no one is in charge. The health secretary, Matt Hancock, is a serial promiser rather than deliverer. He is like a signalman with his wires cut. The chancellor, Rishi Sunak, is clearly not senior enough to win the case for relaxation. The stand-in prime minister, Dominic Raab, intones slogans about “protecting the NHS”. A government that resorts to slogans has lost an argument. There is now a serious functional disconnect between Whitehall on the one hand and the Covid-19 economy on the other. The failures revealed in the 2016 Cygnus report on pandemic preparedness were not acted upon. Sunak’s 80% loan scheme has not worked, because banks were told to shoulder 20% of the risk and many are naturally baling out. It should have been 100%. The furlough subsidies are similarly mired in bureaucracy. Money should have been “printed” and paid into individual bank accounts, not to companies. Most serious has been an apparent collapse in public health beyond the realm of the NHS. From the start of the outbreak, the focus of attention should have been on those already caring for the elderly. Yet for weeks, care homes and home carers were not mentioned and the progress of the virus for them was not monitored. Because they were not “our NHS”, they were not even our dead. The NHS was showered with beds and praise, while its workers were left at home, untested. Local government, which everywhere else in Europe seems to be deeply involved in this emergency, was simply ignored. Equipment was not supplied, money was not spent. You've only got to look at how the re-organisation of the NHS under Lansley removed public health from the NHS. when warned against it by many medical bodies |
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Post by claphamshrew on Apr 21, 2020 1:29:10 GMT 1
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8235979/UKs-coronavirus-crisis-peaked-lockdown-Expert-argues-draconian-measures-unnecessary.htmlOne of the best articles on coronavirus I've read, and I've read a few by now! Carl Heneghan, professor of evidence-based medicine at Oxford University, claims data shows infection rates halved after the Government launched a hand-washing drive and recommend people keep two metres apart on March 16. He said ministers 'lost sight' of the evidence and rushed into a nationwide quarantine six days later after being instructed by scientific advisers who have been 'consistently wrong' during the crisis. The peak of deaths occurred on April 8, and if you understand that then you work backwards to find the peak of infections. That would be 21 days before then, right before the point of lockdown.' Professor Heneghan added: 'Fifty per cent reductions in infections occurred on March 16, right when hand washing and social distancing was introduced. ‘People are avoiding going to GPs and hospitals because they believe there is so much infection there that they might catch it [coronavirus]. That’s really damaging.’ Figures show that more than 80 extra deaths are occurring every day in London alone before paramedics reach the victims because patients are reluctant to phone for an ambulance in case they catch the virus in hospital. Professor Heneghan said the decision to abandon mass-testing and contact tracing had 'completely failed' elderly people. 'The shielding has failed - 70 per cent of all the deaths are in the over-75s. Forty per cent of all the nursing homes have the infection. 'So whatever we have done it has completely failed in terms of shielding. Why did the scientific advisers say to abandon mass testing and contact tracing? 'We can see it worked for other countries like Germany and South Korea, so why? 'If it was about resources – look at what Germany did. It devolved responsibility, getting universities and healthcare sites to carry out tests. 'We centralised it. But that was always going to be impossible for 66million people in the UK. 'We have failed the elderly – care home and healthcare workers needed to be tested and isolated.' He said testing small samples of the population and applying the results to the rest of society was a 'really easy' way out of the nationwide quarantine. 'The key is nobody has really understood how many people actually have the infection,' he added. 'You could do that really quickly - random sampling of 1,000 people in London who thought they had the symptoms. 'You could do that in the next couple of days and get a really key handle on that problem and we would then be able to understand coming out of lockdown much quicker. 'In fact the damaging effects now of lockdown are going to outweigh the damaging effects of coronavirus.' Really? I don't think anyone is denying that peak infections were pre-lockdown given the average time taken to die is 18.5 days from showing symptoms, and infection is an average of 5 days before that. Whilst hand washing may have been encouraged around the 16 March the professor also neglects to acknowledge that in reality lockdown effectively started on the very same day. This is evidenced by the biggest single week drop in public transport use occurring during that very week (see the graph in the article), as many businesses encouraged staff to work from home and many people began avoiding pubs and restaurants even before the statutory implementation of the full lockdown on 23 March. Whilst German demographics have to be taken into account it also interesting to note that 86% of all deaths in Germany are in people over 70 years old. Perhaps there is an argument to be made that the shielding has worked to some degree in the UK? Whilst other countries such as Sweden haven't taken as strict measures it is also important to consider their demographics. For example around 50% of people live on their own, this is far higher than the UK, with a disproportionately high number of these being young people (the average age children leave their parental home is 18/19). You can imagine a higher degree of freedom and movement will be tolerable given this compared to the UK where there are more multi occupancy households and high numbers of young people (who tend to be the most mobile) still living with their parents who are more vulnerable to the disease. |
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Post by staffordshrew on Apr 21, 2020 9:10:17 GMT 1
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Post by northwestman on Apr 21, 2020 9:17:01 GMT 1
A major report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said on Monday that testing and contact tracing in the community is the “most promising approach” in the short term to help lift the lockdown. The study said isolating people with coronavirus and tracing their contacts so they also isolate – an approach abandoned by the UK early on – is the key to controlling further outbreaks.
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Post by ( you know who from b&a ) on Apr 21, 2020 11:36:12 GMT 1
all that touching eyes with hands couldn't have helped either |
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Post by northwestman on Apr 22, 2020 13:38:01 GMT 1
But thorough testing doesn't just give more reliable numbers. It has also allowed Germany to stem the spread of the virus by tracing infection chains and isolating people before they can pass it on to others.
The classic example is the town of Gangelt in Heinsberg district, the epicentre of Germany’s first major outbreak.
On February 25, a 47-year-old resident of the town tested positive for the coronavirus. He and his wife were immediately placed in isolation. But the German authorities didn’t stop there.
Within days, they had traced everyone the couple could have been in contact with during the previous two weeks. That was a lot of people: the couple had spent ten days at packed carnival celebrations and could have passed the infection to hundreds.
But health authorities were able to contact everyone who had been at the carnival and test them. The result was that the outbreak was confined. Heinsberg is over the worst, and the district's shops were allowed to reopen this week.
Unlike in the UK, there is no central authority like the NHS. Hospitals and clinics are independent.
While Public Health England was still arguing over testing regimes and retaining control, in Germany individual GPs were able to order tests for their patients.
And while the NHS tried to boost capacity at a handful of centralised superlabs, in Germany GPs could send samples to a network of 176 public and private laboratories across the country for analysis.
The major outbreak of the virus was introduced to Germany by a very specific path — via skiers returning from winter breaks in the resorts of Austria and Italy. That meant initial infections were confined to the young and fit, who had the best chance of surviving the virus.
And that gave Germany a vital window to start its programme of testing and tracking infection chains before it could spread to the most vulnerable groups, those over 70 or with pre-existing health conditions.
Daily Telegraph.
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Post by northwestman on Apr 22, 2020 16:41:50 GMT 1
www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/22/eu-turns-up-pressure-on-matt-hancock-over-covid-19-ppe-schemeThe health secretary, Matt Hancock, is facing fresh pressure over the protection offered to NHS staff after the European commission said the UK had been given “ample opportunity” to join an EU scheme bulk-buying masks, gowns, gloves and goggles. After a day of confusion in Westminster over the UK’s lack of involvement in the EU’s joint procurement of equipment, a spokesman for the commission appeared to bolster the claim that ministers had taken a “political decision” to opt out. The commission spokesman said UK representatives had been briefed on the EU plans throughout February and March when they could have signed up for the huge purchases of ventilators, laboratory supplies and personal protective equipment. UK officials and ministers have repeatedly said the government only failed to take part in the schemes because “owing to an initial communication problem, the UK did not receive an invitation in time". The commission spokesman told reporters in Brussels: “The EU commission already announced on 31 January that it could help member states with organisation of such joint procurement schemes and this idea of joint procurement and reporting on the state of the medical supplies of the member states was a recurring topic of the agenda of the health and security committee meetings. UK health officials attended meetings on 31 January, 4 February, 2 March and 13 March, where joint procurement rounds for protective gear, ventilators and medical supplies were discussed. “The UK was, as all other members of the health security committee meetings, aware of the work that was ongoing and had ample opportunity to express its wish to participate in a joint procurement if it wanted to do so. As to why it did not participate, this is obviously something on which we cannot comment.” On Tuesday, the health secretary was forced to deny claims, since retracted, by the UK’s most senior diplomat, Sir Simon McDonald, that ministers had made a “political decision” in not getting involved.
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Post by thesensationaljt on Apr 22, 2020 18:51:18 GMT 1
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Post by SeanBroseley on Apr 23, 2020 6:32:45 GMT 1
It is absolutely scandalous that Covid-19 positive patients are still being released into care homes to infect other residents. link |
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Post by Chief Inspector Swan on Apr 23, 2020 7:34:54 GMT 1
Shane Broseley et al need to stop reading the Guardian, which in recent weeks is acting purely to harm the collective mental health of the nation to a greater degree than any covid-19 outbreak.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 23, 2020 8:50:39 GMT 1
Shane Broseley et al need to stop reading the Guardian, which in recent weeks is acting purely to harm the collective mental health of the nation to a greater degree than any covid-19 outbreak. The only thing harming my mental health is your posts . |
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Post by shrewder on Apr 23, 2020 8:53:38 GMT 1
Shane Broseley et al need to stop reading the Guardian, which in recent weeks is acting purely to harm the collective mental health of the nation to a greater degree than any covid-19 outbreak. The only thing harming my mental health is your posts . Well said. |
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