Some conditions have been removed from shielding list

[AKissAndASmile]

I'd not heard about this and not seen any threads about it on here

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/27/phone-texts-notify-cancer-transplant-and-asthma-patients-they-are-off-shielding-list#maincontent

[Lurkingforawhile]

@MyEyesightIsBadLetsGoForADrive (great name!) Have you contacted your local council? Most have a community hub who would be able to help you. Have you had any luck with supermarket deliveries? If not I know they are adding people to their priority lists if you can get through. Sorry you've been ignored by the system 😔

[Gingerninja4]

D's is still 8n shielding group for asthma mix if the tablets and inahler combo and just had 4th dose of steroid tablets in 5 months

[Wingedharpy]

Read elsewhere that these texts were sent out in error.
GP's are, allegedly, going through their lists to see who can come off the "extremely vulnerable" category, but will contact and discuss with individuals concerned.

Disclaimer : I have no personal experience of this - just what I have read on a shielders' forum.

[Panicbuying]

@lljkk do you have some evidence that transplant patients don’t get Covid badly (not being snarky, would just love to see some good news)- as far as I was aware the immunosuppressive protection against cytokine storms was just a hypothesis and the actual outcomes for kidney transplant patients at least are quite poor?

[yunalis]

@Wingedharpy do you think they’ll add something about lupus anticoagulant or APS to the list then? I saw some stuff on twitter about lupus anticoagulant and feel slightly concerned now

[lljkk]

I am only trusting DD, tbh, but here's some medical chatter to support that theory. I guess it's preliminary?

March, The Lancet: "in hyperinflammation immunosuppression is likely to be beneficial"

people on immunosuppressive drugs for arthritis: "do not seem to be at increased risk of respiratory or life-threatening complications from SARS-CoV-2 compared with the general population."

UK patients, less risky than if they had flu: " [[https://www.acnr.co.uk/2020/04/clinical-viewpoint-immunosuppression-and-covid-19/ immunosuppression may protect against severe COVID. When comparing 2249 patients admitted to ITU in the UK with severe COVID-19 the proportion of immunocompromised patients was 3.7x lower than the proportion of immunocompromised patients admitted to ITU with viral pneumonia (the comparator) between 2017 and 2019 (2.3% vs. 8.5%, p

[Panicbuying]

Thanks for digging all that out @lljkk, sounds hopeful for the liver transplant patients (and perhaps why some of them appear to be being removed from the shielding list). It does seem that kidney transplant patients are at significant risk (that London paper is actually the best set of outcomes I’ve seen, seems to be worse news coming out in some US and Italian papers ). Wish this was all over

[Whattodowhattodooo]

My Mum received 2 texts and 3 letters advising her to shield.

She has type 2 diabetes, hypertension and hyperthyroidism.

She tried to register for the food deliveries and was promptly told she didn't qualify for it.... Despite her 2 texts and 3 letters 🤦‍♀️

[Binglebong]

I've been told about this at work today
My info is limited but here is what I was told:

Rather than taking off specific conditions Doctors have been told to go through their lists on shielded people and assess them individually. So you might have someone who on paper looks terribly for ticking boxes but is in fact very fit taken off and someone who should on paper be healthy kept on. This is obviously going to work better where you see the same doctor often but as the more vulnerable are likely to see doctors regularly it should work out. Doctors should be contacting patients directly - the texts should not have happened.


Those who are taken off will no longer be eligible for free food boxes but will still get priority supermarket slots.

Hope that helps. Unfortunately I'm unlikely to find out much more.

[Wingedharpy]

@yunalis : I have no idea, sorry.

@lljkk : Thanks for those interesting links.
The numbers studied, understandably, are quite small in the scheme of things - don't know if that's good or bad!
Strangely, or maybe not, the longer time since transplant, the poorer the outcome.

I flip between feeling quite calm about all this one minute and like a lab rat about to pop my clogs, the next.

[lljkk]

longer time since transplant must be much older people, I presume, with heaps of other problems that come with older age. Not sure age was adjusted for otherwise...

[YouKnowWhoo]

My two children (both under 6) have severe asthma. They got the letters (late) and we’ve been shielding - I would love to believe they are not at such high risk as I am so worried for them? As a family we are shielding.

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

I'm on methotrexate. I started receiving shielding texts last month along with advice from one of my consultants that they suggest shielding, but essentially it was up to me to interpret the advice. The official shielding letter never arrived.

After a few weeks I asked my gp to review me with a view to taking me off the list. He agreed, so I'm back to the highly vulnerable category.

[iVampire]

‘longer time since transplant must be much older people, I presume, with heaps of other problems that come with older age’

They will be older than when they had their transplant, but may well not be ‘older age’ in a population sense. Some will still be children. And ‘old age’ can be remarkably trouble free - to the extent that age in itself is not a shielding category

I’m sorry if that sounds a bit tetchy, especially to people on here who are well aware that shielded are unlikely to be old/decrepit/terminal !

[Panicbuying]

@ivampire yes 20 years post tx here but at 40 definitely don’t consider myself over the hill yet . Also not meaning to be tetchy, just get frustrated by some of the posts (not llkjj’s I hasten to add- but some pretty callous stuff I’ve seen on AIBU lately) on here making out that people on the shielding list are all decrepit and going to die soon regardless of Covid so who cares? I’m almost certainly fitter than most of them and probably younger than half of them!

[SauvignonBlanche]

Strangely, or maybe not, the longer time since transplant, the poorer the outcome

That’s not good news, DH is in his 50s but had his Tx In his 20s.

[ZiggeryZaggy]

I received a phone call, from the asthma nurse, about two weeks ago. She told me the guidelines had changed and that I no longer needed to sheild.

[FourTeaFallOut]

What was the change that took you off the list ziggeryzaggy, if you don't mind me asking?

[lljkk]

so now I'm intrigued, in those studies I listed, about folk had who kidney transplants & covid:
study 1
patients were

1. 45yo M with 2nd failing kidney transplant since age 42, was very ill
2. 48yo man who had received his kidney age 17 or 18 (made full recovery)
3. 54yo F got kidney age 46 (survived but very ill before that)
4. 54yo M got kidney age 47 (mild with covid & recovered)
5. 65yo M wheelchair bound got kidney age 63 (was very ill but survived)
6. 67yo F received kidney age 66 (died). also had T2 diabetes
7. 69yo F multi-morbidities got kidney age 61 (survived but still inpatient)

So yeah, one of them got kidney as a 'child' maybe. Only one of them died. Most of them had multiple other health problems.

Study 2.
10 patients, aged 30-80yo at point of covid infection, all had other health conditions like T2DM but mostly hypertension. 3 died out of 10.
Age when they had their (most recent kidney) transplants (years):
~26, ~30, ~40 (age 56 at death), ~45, 50, ~52 (age 57 at death), ~54, ~60, ~65 (age 75 at death, also had cancer), ~66 (age 80 with covid but survived)

No sign of anyone who got the kidney transplant as a child.

It's not clear how much the kidney transplant adds on top of the risks from their other health problems. tbh, given their bags of other health issues, I think they are surviving very well. Probably because so few under age 70.

[maggiso]

I keep getting texts - but I’ve never had the letter. I thought I might get taken off - as I’ve not been or oral steroids for a while now- but the bin text popped up a week or two back. My asthma used to be a bit brittle but this years been better.

[BigChocFrenzy]

If doctors are now assessing people individually, then they may be removing young and even middle-aged patients with health conditions,
because the greatest risk of all is age

Very few people under 45 have died, even with serious health conditions - and some have not been able to shield.

So e.g. someone aged 20-45 with conditions that multiply their risk may still be at a lower risk than a healthy person in their early 60s whohas to work outside the home.

[ofwarren]

#BingleBong
Is this true about still getting priority supermarket slots?
That's all I'm bothered about to be honest. If they "unshield" my son I still want to stay home.

[ofwarren]

Sorry, @BingleBong

[Binglebong]

That is what I was told. I don't know how it will turn out in reality of course but I did ask and that was the answer I was given.

[Orangeblossom78]

Interesting. DH is on mtx and humira, is in moderate group and it says if also have things like heart disease or diabetes as well, would be more at risk.

I noticed humira is being trialled as a possible treatment for covid as well