Are BAME now safe?
The government has yesterday accepted the recommendation from the independent Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to approve Pfizer/BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine for use.
This follows months of rigorous clinical trials and a thorough analysis of the data by experts at the MHRA who have concluded that the vaccine has met its strict standards of safety, quality and effectiveness.
Britain's medicines regulator, the MHRA, says the jab, which offers up to 95% protection against Covid-19 illness, is safe to be rolled out next week.
The Health Secretary has said a first batch of 800,000 doses will be available in the UK from next week. We understand that NHS staff, elderly people and those in care homes will be prioritised first.
We have learned that decisions on who will be offered vaccines in this first wave based on exposure to risk is as follows;
• Older Peoples’ Inpatient Services staff
• Care homes staff
• Staff certified as Clinically Extremely Vulnerable where it will enable them to return to work, and
• BAME staff who are over 50 and therefore most at risk – plus others who may have been identified as most at risk in their wellbeing assessment.
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