There's another vaccine! And we've got 60 million shots! And it's made here!

[HelloThereMeHearties]

And it's effective against the new UK variant!

And it will really wind the EU up!!!

Novavax has passed its stage three trial, now hopefully the MHRA will approve it!!!

I feel so sorry for them. I mean, at least if you hate the Tory govt, you can vote against them in the next election. What can they do in the EU?!

@cplusername1234

I'm delighted and proud that important scientific work is done here in the UK, and that vaccines are more available to us. It's brilliant!

But this "we won, haha fuck Europe" attitude makes me so sad.

Of course we should be rightly proud of what many people here have worked to achieve, of course this is a brilliant country! But as a European who has settled here, this crowing attitude just makes me so sad. Why cant we just be happy about what the brilliant scientists have achieved. Why does it have to be a competition.

But I guess I'm not British so who cares what I think

I feel sorry for the people of the EU. It's the tossers at the top, who are rattling their sabres and looking to make AZ and the UK the baddies to draw attention away from their own failings, who I despise.

My parents and DD live in Belgium. DD works for the EU. They’re watching to see what happens and I’m hoping that my parents get their vaccinations soon.

France has said it is closing their borders to all non EU countries.

What the hell is the EU up to. They're looking madder and madder.

I'm so glad were out of the EU. All the 'still European' posts annoy me tremendously. We are still European. It's a continent. The EU was just an unbearable overpriced club.

@Originalyellowbelly

France has said it is closing their borders to all non EU countries.

Say what now? Don’t tell me we’re going to be back to Operation Stack?

The EU is escalating all of this in a very dangerous and reckless manner.

Say what you will about Bojo (I'm normally the last to praise him), but it sounds like he got a cracking, water tight contract with AZ. Unlike EU, who seem to have quite a flimsy one.

It's obvious France is going to stop lorries from the UK travelling to and from UK, this could get very difficult for us.

@Originalyellowbelly

It's obvious France is going to stop lorries from the UK travelling to and from UK, this could get very difficult for us.

Really?

I didn’t think that I hope not

@Originalyellowbelly

France has said it is closing their borders to all non EU countries.

Its already been said there is an exemption for haulage.

Dont be panicking yet.

Thats next level trade war. We aren't at Defcom 1 just yet. We remain at about a 3.

I think we’re back to defcom 2 just heard on bbc they are backtracking on this article 16 nonsense

So France is closing the borders to protect themselves against new variants. Well, I wish them luck with that given the fact that there is evidence that the 'British' variant actually originated from France.

@Frazzled2207

I think we’re back to defcom 2 just heard on bbc they are backtracking on this article 16 nonsense

We are back on Defcom 3 (1 is nuclear was, 5 is lowest threat)

From what im reading it sounds like EU HQ fucked up big style and invoked article 16. Except they forget to ask the Irish. Who subsequently went batshit, rang up HQ swearing lots saying wtaf are you doing? Do you understand the politics here? Do you understand we have a shared border? Do you have a clue what you are doing? Then they rang the british saying, weve read the fucking riot act to the EU, stay calm its being sorted. Then the EU has tried to play jedi mind tricks and pretend its never happened. Except thats not worked and it was noticed.

This sees the Irish now stepping up to the mediator role. Cos they are stuck - like AZ themselves - in the middle of an absolute cluster fuck.

Joy.

just heard on bbc they are backtracking on this article 16 nonsense

Sadly it doesn't matter, even if they pedal back on all the unwise threats they've made
As I said on another thread the worldwide community's seen them for exactly what they are, and the responsibility for repairing the damage - if it ever can be repaired - is entirely theirs

An American op posted this on another thread:

The Wall Street Journal ran a great editorial about this last night, before the EU went completely bonkers:

The EU blows its rollout and blames a pharmaceutical firm

It's fairly long, so here are the last two paragraphs

Brussels soon will give national governments the power to block millions of vaccine doses from being exported from Europe. Such restrictions will certainly backfire, as other countries retaliate against Europe and complex supply chains fall apart.

Brussels is demonstrating its unique knack for self-foot-shooting by transforming its crisis of vaccine incompetence into deeper economic harm. The EU’s paramount challenge after the pandemic ebbs will be to revive economic growth despite decades of policy mismanagement. Yet nothing says “closed for business” like harassing companies that provide life-saving medical treatments.

That's pretty much the consensus on this side of the pond.

@fieldofyellowflowers tbf not sure if there is evidence of that but I did notice when someone said to hancock the other day the british variant he did make a point of saying the one spotted here or something like that.
Not sure if we will ever know
But it makes sense to shut borders to limit numbers

Reposting from upthread. Informative article.

www.theguardian.com/society/2021/jan/29/we-had-to-go-it-alone-how-the-uk-got-ahead-in-the-covid-vaccine-race

[quote donewithitalltodayandxmas]@fieldofyellowflowers tbf not sure if there is evidence of that but I did notice when someone said to hancock the other day the british variant he did make a point of saying the one spotted here or something like that.
Not sure if we will ever know
But it makes sense to shut borders to limit numbers [/quote]
I don't think we will ever know its common for varients be named after places they were discovered.
We have better genome sequencing apparently there's 2 levels.
Saw on Dr John Campbell you tube channel that there's speculation the Kent variant is very close to one found in Italy so who knows.

Wonder if macron still asking UK government bail out French state majority owned eurostar.
Dident realise french has shut borders is this just leisure or business too as imagine lot of daily travel between London and Paris .
I assume French national or eu can go there just not us brits.
My cousin moved there so God knows when we get to see him again.

Well they screwed up with Ireland.
Wonder what next move In their game wi be.

Saw on Dr John Campbell you tube channel that there's speculation the Kent variant is very close to one found in Italy so who knows.

Yeah, we don't know where this variant originated, but the UK does something like 50% of all the viral genome sequencing in the world, so we discovered it and ergo, it's been named 'the British/Kent variant'. I too am sceptical though about where it originated, since it was discovered in Kent, the closest county to mainland Europe and home to our #1 port with Europe. If this 'British' variant had been found in Norfolk or Worcestershire or Perthshire then fine, maybe it mutated here, but Kent? Definitely suspicious.

Why? It was widespread in U.K. before being identified in Europe. Nothing to do with the lack of proper lock down and rapid spread in U.K.?

I too am sceptical though about where it originated, since it was discovered in Kent, the closest county to mainland Europe and home to our #1 port with Europe.

It didn't originate in Dover, though. The original spike in infections was in a specific area in North Kent. There was a lot of local discussion about it at the time because nobody, including the LA and the health authority, knew why. Then it began to spread out from there. Then it was identified as a new variant.

It's called the Kent variant, but isn't and never has been equally prevalent all over the county. Dover has tended to have lower numbers than some other areas. Things are just levelling out now.

I live in Kent and have been watching the numbers since the autumn.

@Avondklok

Why? It was widespread in U.K. before being identified in Europe. Nothing to do with the lack of proper lock down and rapid spread in U.K.?

The thing is, we’ll never really know, because genome sequencing in Europe is nowhere near as comprehensive as it is here.

So genome sequencers in U.K. can't work out where it came from if it's European? That's not how it works,