To consider paying for a private Covid immunisation?

I’m glad I found this thread, I didn’t realise private Covid vaccinations were available! I was losing hope they were ever going to be made available, will be definitely be seeking to get this ahead of autumn.

Loads of people have Covid even in summer, and that’s just people who are testing and not including people that think they have a cold haven’t ruled out Covid.

What tests are people using these days?

I'm considering paying for it in the autumn, as well as paying for the flu vaccine - it seems to make sense to do them both when we're about to spend more time huddled indoors. Also early 60s, also not vulnerable, but it seems a long time since I've had a booster.

@CherubEarrings I'm same era as you getting over COVID was like a summer cold and I'm asthmatic.

Husband had the jab in the spring. His COVID has been a lot worse.

You can still book it free on the NHS booking site if you meet the criteria, @PeloMom We’ve booked ours for tomorrow. I read somewhere though that tomorrow is the last day you can (which is why we booked).

What I find unreasonable is the NHS charging for the vaccine

Fine, I’ll settle for not dying any day.

Are you easy baffled? What exactly are you finding hard to understand?

I get the spring booster because I'm ECV but it didn't prevent me catching Covid again 😒 might have shortened it a bit.

But that's you. There are many many people who it barely registered with pre vaccines then had a horrible case after. And there's many people who had a terrible first, third and fourth time but had a mild sniffle the second and fifth. My unvaccinated friend barely noticed in 2022. I barely noticed after vaccines in 2022. We both got it from the same place (we assume as we'd been out together in a busy place then came down ill soon after) and both had very similar very mild symptoms.
I'm not against vaccines. If there was evidence it stopped you catching it or even just feeling really really ill then I'd have it. But there isn't. As a previous poster said the vaccine may well stop people dying, but it doesn't stop people feeling like death for days or weeks. Or in some cases, it doesn't even stop them dying.

I don’t visit if I have any illness but the issue with Covid is that I can pass it on without knowing.

I want my grandmother to die there in peace with the people she knows, not in hospital unable to breathe. She got Covid twice and even the last time which was just before Christmas they kept her isolated in a side room with no visitors. We’ll happily shove a test up our noses to stop that happening again.

I don’t test routinely, I’m at home with possible Covid now and I’m just minimising who I see (not hard, we live rurally and can WFH) but I do before I visit her. I think that’s just a responsible thing to do. It’s been rife all year in the university I work at so I get plenty of exposure.

Possinass

I had Covid pre vaccine and was very unwell (fit healthy person). Again, after vaccines, and it barely registered.

Seeing as the covid vaccine doesn't stop you getting it or having severe symptoms, what good would it do offering the whole population it over and over?
You say you'll be paying for it next time as getting covid over and over again is bad (which I'm not actually in disagreement with), but the vaccine doesn't stop you catching it or passing it on or getting really ill. So I don't think everyone getting vaccinated repeatedly will stop everyone getting covid repeatedly.

It hasn’t. We’re just finishing the spring Covid booster programme, which is targeted at the most vulnerable.

Vaccines are designed on a macro level to reduce mortality and hospitalisations, not on a micro level to stop people getting poorly. Hence why lately not everyone has been offered a vaccine.

I would speculate that GPs won’t write Covid on a sick note, or put it in the records as it hasn’t been lab confirmed with a recognised approved test (the requirement for recording a notifiable disease).

I don't have a relative that old but I regularly visit a few in their 80s in their own homes. I'd avoid anyone that vulnerable if I had any infectious illness. It wouldn't matter if it was covid or something else and the tests are not reliable.

Yes I'd pay. I've had covid 3 times and each time it has really hit me very hard. My siblings suffered badly as well. Covid goes for certain people, for reasons unknown. If you are one of those people, then yes get the jab.

I am CEV and after my 2nd booster I was so ill I decided to tv take my chance with Covid. Just had Covid and felt crap for over a week but still not taking any more Covid jags, just like I didn’t take the flu jag either . In saying all that, your body, your money so if you want it, get it - no one else’s business but yours.

Most will have protection from previous infection.

Yes, if I was 60 and using public transport, I’d pay, assuming my GP had no concerns.

When you’re extremely ill and have been for two weeks, it’s useful to know what you actually have. My daughter was crying saying she couldn’t stand the light so I wanted to rule out meningitis. Like others have said some people are in contact with vulnerable people as well.

Do you have a 97 year old relative in a care home? I test when I visit to keep her and her friends safe. Why is that so hard to understand?

Baffles me why people are baffled over others testing or having jabs.

Baffles me why people keep having jabs for it and even more baffled that people are still testing!! Crazy.

We haven't been told not to write covid, but most people don't test now

Covid is meant to be notifiable?