AIBU Frontline NHS vaccinations shouldn't be cancelled.

[Toddlerteaplease]

My trust has sent round an email saying that staff vaccination appointments may be cancelled so that more over 80's can be fitted in. I know that they are highly risk as well. I'm CEV and still working frontline (although not on a Covid ward) I really need this vaccine. And was so excited to be able to get a date this month. I'll be really upset and very angry if mine is cancelled. AIBU?

Yanbu at all

No. You're not. Unfortunately.

YABVU.
Frontline NHS staff should never have been a high priority given the specifics of this particular vaccine and the possibility that it doesn't reduce onward transmission (making the argument that NHS staff should be vaccinated to stop them passing the virus on worthless).
That being said there certainly is an argument that the ECV who are having to go out to work (whether that is as a bus driver, shelve stacker or NHS professional (or anything else)) should have been at the top of the list above pensioners who can largely stay at home.

As you're frontline AND CEV you should be getting one ASAP!! Totally agree with that

However, in general it does seem to make sense to vaccinate the over 80's first, not just for their sake or their families, but because it's the best way to protect the NHS & the wider public.

They've said that with the over 80's & the other seriously vulnerable people vaccinated we will stop 99% of deaths.

I hope they have some excess vaccine & you get yours done.

Yanbu
But it seems to me that vaccinations are happening far too slowly anyway. Like everything, this vaccinating is also a shit show.

@ekidmxcl
You are being frankly ridiculous. The vaccine is being rolled out extremely quickly considering the way it needs to be administered, the resources that it takes up (and the competing needs for those resources), the timescales between approval and the beginning of the role out, and the need for a 2nd dose exactly 3 weeks after the first essentially making certain days useless (due to the day 3 weeks later being a bank holiday that nobody would be willing to attend on).

It makes far more sense to do NHS staff first. So that services are not affected. If anyone watched Hospital, you can see the disruption caused by one consultant having symptoms.
Many elderly person are more shielded than younger people.
Weirdly although the government considers me CEV and in the shielding category. I only come out as at moderate risk from my work risk assessment. With a Covid age of 59. (I'm actually only 39 years old though.

I'm hoping mine goes ahead as it's at 6pm on NYE!

@Toddlerteaplease
Unfortunately you are misunderstanding the known benefits of the vaccine. There is absolutely no evidence that this particular vaccine will reduce the levels of transmission of the virus either into those who have received it or from those people onwards to other unvaccinated people. In fact there is a very real risk that vaccinating NHS staff will lead to a greater absence rate through the delayed identification of cases (due to more cases now being asymptomatic) allowing people to work for longer whilst infected and therefore passing it onto more colleagues and patients.

I think I'm just a bit pissed off with feeling that staff don't matter to the powers that be. I came back from annual leave a few months ago to find two Covid positive patients say in the middle of one of our bays. The reason for not moving them to a Covid ward was very lame. Despite not going anywhere near them. I tested positive a week later.

The problem is that the data doesn't suggest that NHS workers are catching the virus any more frequently than society as a whole, but there are other groups of workers that are more likely to catch it. Given that the virus cannot be said to reduce the spread of the virus or the frequency or period that staff are likely to need to isolate the usual reasons for giving NHS priority to a vaccine simply don't exist. This leaves the argument of heightened risk of catching the virus which the data simply doesn't suggest to be true, and in any case if this was the argument being used it should be taxi drivers and supermarket staff first in line rather than NHS staff given the data that is widely available on the risk in specific occupations.
The only reason that NHS staff were ever at the top of the list is political pressure and not at all linked to the science so if some NHS trusts would prefer to listen to the science and therefore vaccinate other groups ahead of their own staff I can't really see any issue with that decision.

*first virus should read vaccine