British doctors warn that hospitals across the country are facing a few weeks of danger in the midst of new infectious coronavirus outbreaks blamed on a new version of the virus
A day after the UK recorded 55,892 new infections and a further 964 coronavirus-related deaths, concerns are emerging about the impact on the National Health Service which is too high. Field hospitals built in the early days of the pandemic but subsequently decommissioned are being reactivated.
Mike Adams, director of the Royal College of Nursing England, told Sky News that the UK was in the “eye of the storm” and that it was “embarrassing” to see people who were not following the social pace guidelines or wearing masks.
A chief physician also warned of a shooting among health workers on the front line of the uprising in hospitals, while also urging people to follow the rules.
“I’m worried,” Adrian Boyle, vice-president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, told the BBC. “We’re very much at battle stations.”
New infections have been doubling in recent weeks after a new strain that is said to be about 70% more contagious has been found behind a large spike in cases around London and the south east of England.
With the loopholes between new cases and subsequent hospitals and deaths, there are serious concerns about the course of the pandemic over the next month or two in a country with the second highest death toll in the region. Europe is associated with a virus at nearly 74,000.
As a result of the spike, which has spread across the country and where lock-in restrictions have been tightened, the strategy around the distribution of vaccines has been changed so that people get the first injection as soon as possible, with a second delayed registration.
In a joint statement on Thursday, the chief medical officers of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland said that the first dose of vaccine offers “substantial” protection.
Currently, two vaccines have been approved for use in the UK
Just under 1 million people have received the first dose of the vaccine developed by the American pharmaceutical company Pfizer and the German biotechnology company BioNTech, with a small minority also receiving the second dose as expected after 21 days.
Along with an agreement earlier this week of the vaccine developed by Oxford University and British pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca, a new dosing schedule has been outlined, aimed at providing faster distribution. This means that the second dose of both vaccines will be available within 12 weeks of the first.
The four medical officers said they were “confident” that the first dose of the two vaccines would provide “substantial” protection.
“In the short term, the further increase in vaccine effectiveness from the second dose is likely to be small; most of the initial protection from clinical infection is after the first dose of the vaccine, “they said.
The new plan has been widely criticized, with the UK’s leading union for doctors warning that delays in the second dose are causing major problems for thousands of elderly and vulnerable people with vaccines.
“It is completely unfair and unfair to the tens of thousands of patients most at risk to try to reschedule their meetings,” said Richard Vautrey of the British Medical Association.
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