Under 50s with no risk factors - how will the rest of 2021 look for us?

[Amidone]

Does anyone expect we will actually be vaccinated with even one dose anytime in 2021? There are already reports that after the current phase 1 groups are completed, teachers, childcare staff, police and shop workers will get next priority and I can see why - I expect teachers might get bumped up the list even quicker if the Gov wants schools reopened. Life will slowly return to more like normal, albeit with distancing and other measures still in place as we still don't know if the vaccines prevent transmission to the unvaccinated or whether the controversial dose spacing approach will give full protection to the vaccinated. I am also unaware of whether anyone knows if the vaccines prevent long Covid. Serious infection seems to be all we know that they help with at the moment so vaccination should reduce hospital pressures.

But for those under 50 and with no health or occupation risk factors, are we going to have to continue to try to dodge Covid until the end of the year, albeit with the reassurance that there'll likely be an ITU bed available for us if we get it badly? Given how lockdown and distancing rules haven't been observed by a significant minority so far, do we think that once vaccinated enough people will continue to put themselves out so to speak, for the protection of others?
I feel quite nervous about it all tbh. I certainly won't be rushing to hug vaccinated family members who may also be hugging other unvaccinated family members.
Can I really expect to avoid Covid infection for the best part of a year and three quarters? Especially as I have school age kids.
Already vaccinated and obviously otherwise healthy older people are telling the TV and radio reporters that they're looking forward to their next holiday abroad soon and trips to the theatre and restaurants. I don't feel able to travel abroad until I've been vaccinated. 2021 feels a write-off still despite the advent of the vaccines. :(

I'm hoping we'll do a huge chunk of the vulnerable and over 50s by late spring - mainly because I'm desperate to attend an antenatal class in person rather than on zoom in May/June. I personally am not worried about the virus at all (30, no health issues) and statistically unless you are extremely vulnerable there is no need to be worried - only about 300 people under 60 with no known health conditions have died. That's nothing statistically out of the tens of millions of that age group. I fully expect all my friends and family to also be happy to mingle etc. without the vaccine once the elderly and vulnerable are vaccinated.

I’m 41 and still waiting for the nhs to offer me my first smear test so I don’t think they’ll manage to organise a vaccine, no.

Just have to take it all one step at a time.

2020 was terrible for all but for me my mental health deteriorated, free-fall, and it got me nowhere.

The working population will be demanding vaccinations, the government have investments in office space in cities, they want workers back, spending, commuting, this won't happen until all have been offered a vaccine.

Saving the NHS, first and foremost.
Then the priority will change to rebuild the economy.

We will all be offered a vaccine as soon as is possible.

I am hoping we all get a relatively normal summer.

I hope they do vaccinate all by September as the younger members return to university, thousands of students in one place would be awful for them.

Once overall risk of the NHS being overwhelmed comes down, restrictions will be lifted. There are no plans to allow vaccinated people any more freedoms than anyone else.

If you choose to restrict yourself beyond the guidelines given by the government that's your choice, and has been since the start of the pandemic.

As another in the 45-50 group with teenage children, I’d really like to know how the priority will be assessed and whether it will be a free for all.

I’ve just run my details through the calculator and it suggests May/June, which is great, but it gave the same result when I halved my age to pretend I was early 20s.

It makes no sense to me based on everything I’ve read to offer early vaccine to a 50yo based on risk, but then lump a 49yo in with much, much younger people.

If you’re under 50 and have no other risk factors what’s the worry? You have as much chance of becoming seriously il or popping your clogs from covid as you have getting seriously injured or killed on the roads. You’ve managed to dodge that so far haven’t you?

@MorrisZapp I think the issue more lies with people who are vaccinated wondering why they should continue following restrictions now that they are low risk, while all the rest of us who have been low risk continue to do the bare minimum to protect those who havent been vaccinated

@safariboot

Even with the vaccination, 2020 was the warm up. 2021 will be worse.

I think there's a very real chance of either the vaccine failing because the British government is administering it wrong, or the virus evolving to bypass the vaccine because the British government has allowed it to run rampant.

FFS.

Have a look t this and be a bit reassured about the risk. We'll get the vaccine at some point but with no other risk factors, you don't need to get too worried. medium.com/wintoncentre/how-much-normal-risk-does-covid-represent-4539118e1196

** said critical care, which includes high dependency as well as ICU.

The source is Prof. Jeremy Brown of UCL (and JCVI) who said in an interview on the radio last weekend that his own critical care unit had half of its patients not on the vaccination priority lists.
He is a highly trustworthy source.

Other critical care staff do report the same, but less officially.

I did not specifically say that that the new variant affected the young more, but that since there has been the new variant, increasingly under-50s are being hospitalised (that is supported by the statistics). If the average age of a critical care patient with Covid-19 is now 60 (which apparently it is), then statistically there will be approx equal numbers above and above 60 years old.**

If you look at the ICNARC data for January you will see it is 20% under 50s in critical care. That is still not great, but I don't think it is helpful to claim 50% are under 50 because it worries people.

I presume until all over 18s (who want to be..let’s not even start on those who don’t) have been vaccinated in the autumn, the spring and summer will feel much like the summer of 2020 did - ie. a bit weird, but much much better than the current lockdown.

I’d also say that healthy under 50s need to be careful to keep the risk in perspective. I understand it’s easy to be swept away by panic looking at the news, social media etc., but the risk of a healthy under 50 year old requiring hospitalisation is very small. It’s likely you face far greater risks from things you’re not obsessing about in the same way - not sure that’s helpful to the anxiously-inclined, but it is true! I think a lot of people have absorbed a mistaken belief that the risk from COVID is to them individually, rather than to the health system.

I do think once hospitalisation falls, death rate falls and it gets warmer messaging will change and be closer to the very low risk.

They’ll probably be incentives to spend. Where we are will be different. Some might think of personal risk first but I reckon for many behaviour will change.

I don't think it is helpful to claim 50% are under 50 because it worries people

I wasn't claiming anything. I was restating what was stated by a highly respected critical care professor in his London hospital.

London has more of the new variant so the composition of critical care (not just ICU) maybe more pronounced towards under-60s there.

@MrsApplepants

I’m 41 and still waiting for the nhs to offer me my first smear test so I don’t think they’ll manage to organise a vaccine, no.

Do you watch the TV at all?

Mid 40s secondary teacher. I am not holding out much hope about getting an early vaccine.

I don't understand why we wouldn't be back to normal by end of summer? If the vulnerable groups are vaccinated well before that and enough of non-vulnerable have received their vaxx too. Surely that is enough to lower the rates to an acceptable level?

We should all be pushing for parents to be vaxxed
As schools are 0.4 of r even before 'new variant'
If we are being prevented from kids wearing masks
Teachers even vaxxwd can still spread as can other parents who are vaxxed
Everyone with gp will start hugging them again... Dangerous potentially for elderly or the kids
Schools are the main unmasked place.
And frankly while 60 kids mixing why on earth is any parent going to be careful as will only catch it from kids.
We may end up catching multiple times before vax.

@safariboot

Even with the vaccination, 2020 was the warm up. 2021 will be worse.

I think there's a very real chance of either the vaccine failing because the British government is administering it wrong, or the virus evolving to bypass the vaccine because the British government has allowed it to run rampant.

You should do a stand up routine 😂

Almost 65% of the population are working age ie 16-65. This age group is heavily skewed in covid infections so perhaps 80% of all covid infections are within this age group. There are c4,000 critical care beds in the country, so you’re saying that 2,000 of them might be occupied by under 50s out of perhaps 40 million people. And some people think this is unacceptable risk in daily life?

Not going to comment on that but there’s so much information out there to confirm that the risk to people in this age group is tiny and no more significant than many other infectious diseases or general risks - it’s simply that a shit load of people have it at the same time.

I find it a bit galling that I’m expected to stay home to protect everyone else, and then take my chances with the bloody thing anyone. BUT I’d rather that than the alternative which is crouching at home til the vaccination winds it’s way round to me. For me, it’s unlikely to be all that bad, and it’s a risk I’m prepared to take. The numbers fell dramatically over the summer last year anyway and if we’re all due to be vaccinated by September, I think it’s a matter of getting on with it. I want to get back to a life, not just an existence.

@GibbertyFlibbet

As another in the 45-50 group with teenage children, I’d really like to know how the priority will be assessed and whether it will be a free for all.

I’ve just run my details through the calculator and it suggests May/June, which is great, but it gave the same result when I halved my age to pretend I was early 20s.

It makes no sense to me based on everything I’ve read to offer early vaccine to a 50yo based on risk, but then lump a 49yo in with much, much younger people.

It has changed, hasn't it, it's gone from 1 million doses per week to 2 million. When I looked a couple of days ago it said I could expect my first vaccine between I think mid-July and end-September, now it's saying between mid-May and end-June (I'm 47).

Boris has also said that once all the older age groups have been done they'll consider running vaccine clinics 24 hours a day. I would go anytime they give me an appointment - even at 3am.

Also, I know the thing about there being younger people in ICU now, but surely some of these people also have comorbidities - and are therefore likely to be vaccinated early on? Once they and the older age groups are vaccinated, won’t the numbers in ICU really fall fast?

@BluebellsGreenbells

I hope they do vaccinate all by September as the younger members return to university, thousands of students in one place would be awful for them.

This is a really good point - unis were hot-beds of transmission back in the autumn so it really is in the govt's interest to reach ALL adults by the autumn of 2021 to prevent a re-run.

In terms of transmission late teens/early 20s are a real priority - they're the ones who are going out in huge numbers to pubs, bars, clubs, dating, partying - so while they're unlikely to get really ill or die, they could easily drive a massive resurgence of Covid if they aren't vaccinated quickly and along with everyone else.

Young people are a greater proportion of itu than hospitalised or deaths, because they are prioritised for itu over frail elderly who are unlikely to be saved.