Brexit matters

[21C101]

Why?

Do you think not being in the EU has helped the UK's vaccine situation? How?

What has not being in the EU enabled the UK to do regarding vaccines that it could not have done from within the EU?

Even if you think a remainer government would have not joined the EU vaccine scheme which stretches credibility given how remainers were wailing that the UK government had blood on its hands for not joining and forecasting uk vaccine doom, there is the small matter that we would be on the hook for funding the restoration of the smouldering economic wreck thwt many EU states now face.

 

[birchesgreen]

Even if you think a remainer government would have not joined the EU vaccine scheme which stretches credibility given how remainers were wailing that the UK government had blood on its hands for not joining and forecasting uk vaccine doom, there is the small matter that we would be on the hook for funding the restoration of the smouldering economic wreck thwt many EU states now face.

I'd be careful casting any stones, the UK economy is not exactly rosy either.

 

[21C101]

Yes, I see what you mean. Britain is now a completeley independent sovereign nation, arguably the greatest nation in the world, and everybody else can stick it where the sun don't shine.

I mean, imagine if Britain was reliant on electricity imports from the EU to keep it's electricity grid from blacking out, and reliant on food imports from the EU to feed itself, then it would be completely screwed if the EU decided to impose any kind of sanctions, so it's a good job none of that is the case.

Oh wait...

Food can be obtained elsewhere (much more cheaply). All of 2 Gigawatts comes across the channel on that interconnector and it works both ways.

If France ever did cut it off, say in the middle of a winter high with no sun and no wind then it will be popcorn time.

I'd be careful casting any stones, the UK economy is not exactly rosy either.

Indeed, another reason I don't want to be bailing out half of Europe while Germany continues to power ahead due to the Euro gicing its currency an ariuficially low value and implicitly subsidising its exports.

Heavens, I'm grumpy this morning.

 

[birchesgreen]

If France ever did cut it off, say in the middle of a winter high with no sun and no wind then it will be popcorn time.

Only if you have a battery operated popcorn maker.

 

[alex397]

Remainers are remarkably quiet over the latest Euro vaccine fiasco. first blame the UK, then the vaccine manufacturers, now the vaccine to explain slow roll out.

Perhaps they think all the elderly Brexiteers will die of blood clots. The elderly who were young when they were given the chance to vote to remain in the Common Market but not the Maastricht treaty and have lived through the last 40 years. I wonder if the PIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain) will stop holidaymakers who have had the Oxford vaccine in favour of the profit making Phizer vaccine.

If you looked at things in a more balanced way you would see that many Remainers accept that the EU has faults, and the vaccine rollout has been a big one.
Have you seen the news? Have you seen other threads on this very forum? Remainers are not being remarkably quiet.

 

[Dave1987]

Anyone remember the likes of the Daily Express belittling Sanofi for their failed attempt at their first vaccine trails? Simply because Sanofi is a french pharma company.

 

[najaB]

What a total horlicks, thank goodness we left when we did.

As others have said, the Brexit "benefit" of vaccine supply and distribution has nothing to do with Brexit! It's just happenstance that the UK-based plants have had a higher production rate than the EU-based ones, it happens all the tine with vaccine production, and largely why they have multiple production lines in the first place. It could just as easily have turned out that the UK plants were under-producing. And on the distribution side, the UK has the advantage (for now) of the NHS which, believe it or not, we also had when we were members of the EU. Of course, it was significantly weakened by Brexit, and is likely a target under any US trade deal we manage to scrape together, but for now it has allowed us to roll out vaccination in a more centralised and organised manner than many of our EU neighbours.

I'll miss it when it's gone.

 

[Dave1987]

Remainers are remarkably quiet over the latest Euro vaccine fiasco. first blame the UK, then the vaccine manufacturers, now the vaccine to explain slow roll out.

Perhaps they think all the elderly Brexiteers will die of blood clots. The elderly who were young when they were given the chance to vote to remain in the Common Market but not the Maastricht treaty and have lived through the last 40 years. I wonder if the PIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain) will stop holidaymakers who have had the Oxford vaccine in favour of the profit making Phizer vaccine.

I seem to remember your belittling Sanofi for their failed attempt at their first vaccine. Now the shoe is on the other foot and the AZ vaccine is being questioned it is all very very different isn't it. I don't trust a word BoJo says so if he says its safe I will not take it.

Even if you think a remainer government would have not joined the EU vaccine scheme which stretches credibility given how remainers were wailing that the UK government had blood on its hands for not joining and forecasting uk vaccine doom, there is the small matter that we would be on the hook for funding the restoration of the smouldering economic wreck thwt many EU states now face.

The UK has more debt than its ENTIRE GDP. We are one of the most unproductive economies in the world. The EU has some extremely productive economies and desirable holiday locations that people want to visit. Wonder which one is looking more rosy post Covid? I would stop reading the propaganda in the Express and Telegraph, its blinding you to the brutal realities of the mess the UK is in.

 

[REVUpminster]

Sanofil is now producing pfizer; plenty of profits there. Will they want oxford jabbed customers to all these holiday destinations? This site has plenty of pro EU propaganda. We were told to test, we tested and more than any other country in europe. Test and trace did work until it's overwhelmed by numbers as it was in every other country. I live one mile from the first outbreak last March where returning skiers brought the virus back from Italy. The local health authority got on top of it very quickly and it did not spread into the wider locality. This country brought back 3 million brits from overseas in the early months. Test and trace had no chance.

 

[21C101]

I seem to remember your belittling Sanofi for their failed attempt at their first vaccine. Now the shoe is on the other foot and the AZ vaccine is being questioned it is all very very different isn't it. I don't trust a word BoJo says so if he says its safe I will not take it.


The UK has more debt than its ENTIRE GDP. We are one of the most unproductive economies in the world. The EU has some extremely productive economies and desirable holiday locations that people want to visit. Wonder which one is looking more rosy post Covid? I would stop reading the propaganda in the Express and Telegraph, its blinding you to the brutal realities of the mess the UK is in.

Bilge. All the large EU states except Germany had higher debt to GDP rates than the UK before Coronavirus hit.

In any case, to quote Dan Hodges this morning:

"Remainers can point to as many sets of bad trade figures as they like. As long as the EU keeps carrying on like this, the British people are going to believe Brexit was the best decision of their lives.

The British Government's decision to pursue a successful independent vaccine licensing and procurement strategy has embarrassed the EU politically. That's what lies at the heart of all this. If Remainers want to try and deny that, fine. But they're not helping their cause."

Meanwhile Italy has let the cat out of the bag.

"BREAKING: The decision by Germany, Italy, France, and other EU countries to suspend AstraZeneca's vaccine is a "political one", the director general of Italy's medicines authority has said"

https://mobile.twitter.com/PoliticsForAlI/status/1371766682302156804

 

[Dave1987]

Bilge. All the large EU states except Germany had higher debt to GDP rates than the UK before Coronavirus hit.

In any case, to quote Dan Hodges this morning:

"Remainers can point to as many sets of bad trade figures as they like. As long as the EU keeps carrying on like this, the British people are going to believe Brexit was the best decision of their lives.

The British Government's decision to pursue a successful independent vaccine licensing and procurement strategy has embarrassed the EU politically. That's what lies at the heart of all this. If Remainers want to try and deny that, fine. But they're not helping their cause."

Meanwhile Italy has let the cat out of the bag.

"BREAKING: The decision by Germany, Italy, France, and other EU countries to suspend AstraZeneca's vaccine is a "political one", the director general of Italy's medicines authority has said"

https://mobile.twitter.com/PoliticsForAlI/status/1371766682302156804

I believe old BoJo is the most unscrupulous politician ever so simply because he has said that the AZ vaccine is safe I will not be having a vaccine if it’s the AZ one that I am offered. I truly believe that when the true realities of Brexit are realised and the Covid pandemic is in the past the UK will be begging to rejoin the huge market that is the EU. I seem to remember being told that once the UK left then the EU would crumble, it hasn’t. BoJo spending billions and billions of £'s on handing lucrative contracts to friends of members of the cabinet is going to sink him long term.

 

[Dave1987]

Bilge. All the large EU states except Germany had higher debt to GDP rates than the UK before Coronavirus hit.

In any case, to quote Dan Hodges this morning:

"Remainers can point to as many sets of bad trade figures as they like. As long as the EU keeps carrying on like this, the British people are going to believe Brexit was the best decision of their lives.

The British Government's decision to pursue a successful independent vaccine licensing and procurement strategy has embarrassed the EU politically. That's what lies at the heart of all this. If Remainers want to try and deny that, fine. But they're not helping their cause."

Meanwhile Italy has let the cat out of the bag.

"BREAKING: The decision by Germany, Italy, France, and other EU countries to suspend AstraZeneca's vaccine is a "political one", the director general of Italy's medicines authority has said"

https://mobile.twitter.com/PoliticsForAlI/status/1371766682302156804

Ow and another thing. Because of the sheer size of the EU the Euro is considered the second most important currency after the Greenback (i.e the dollar). So when the UK loses Euro clearing to Germany or France because the belligerence of BoJo, the UK will have lost a crucial link to the second most important currency in the world. Just like these freeports that BoJo is championing post Brexit. There are many freeports within the EU but they are renowned for money laundering and smuggling, the amount of money that it costs to police freeports means the gains of them are argable.

 

[REVUpminster]

On the news today Pfizer cause blood clots, as all vaccines have side effects, but Euro propaganda ignore that.

We have to rely on statistics from Austria that put anti freeze into wine (good on a cold winters day) and fiddled emissions from German diesel cars.

 

[class ep-09]

On the news today Pfizer cause blood clots, as all vaccines have side effects, but Euro propaganda ignore that.

We have to rely on statistics from Austria that put anti freeze into wine (good on a cold winters day) and fiddled emissions from German diesel cars.

That’s right , we can 100% our own correct , unbiased government that just broke international treaty just signed and tries to blame the sh...t show it created on someone else.

You are scraping the barrel.

 

[REVUpminster]

Still ignoring why astra zeneca is being treated differently to phizer. Are you a shareholder looking forward to a bigger dividend?

 

[Domh245]

Still ignoring why astra zeneca is being treated differently to phizer. Are you a shareholder looking forward to a bigger dividend?

Because there wasn't a spate of unexplained severe and fatal reactions following people being given the Pfizer vaccine...

 

[AlterEgo]

I believe old BoJo is the most unscrupulous politician ever so simply because he has said that the AZ vaccine is safe I will not be having a vaccine if it’s the AZ one that I am offered.

I wish there was a vaccine against this sort of "own the cons/libs" thinking.

 

[Horizon22]

Because there wasn't a spate of unexplained severe and fatal reactions following people being given the Pfizer vaccine...

Only there isn't a "spate" of anything; the blood clot levels are at the standard level as expected in the general population and equal between both vaccines.

 

[edwin_m]

Only there isn't a "spate" of anything; the blood clot levels are at the standard level as expected in the general population and equal between both vaccines.

And far more people will die from Covid if the vaccines are stopped than any death toll from blood clots.

 

[21C101]

Only there isn't a "spate" of anything; the blood clot levels are at the standard level as expected in the general population and equal between both vaccines.

The blood clot levels in those who had the Astra vaccine is rather lower than the typical blood clot rate for the general population.

Still, Europes loss is the Commonwealths gain.

That’s right , we can 100% our own correct , unbiased government that just broke international treaty just signed and tries to blame the sh...t show it created on someone else.

You are scraping the barrel.

No it hasn't. There is a requirement in the protocol for checks to be proportionate to the risk being mitigate. The checks are manifestly disproportionate, hence the UK is well within its rights to act.

 

[Domh245]

Only there isn't a "spate" of anything; the blood clot levels are at the standard level as expected in the general population and equal between both vaccines.

If you look at it in terms of numbers of cases presenting, then yes, it would all appear fine (particularly when you start lumping together all AZ that has been injected)

However when you look at it from the other end, where (taking just Norway, as an example of a country who are IMO right to take the action they have) - 3 severe blood clots in young patients who you wouldn't expect them in, and a fatality from a brain haemorrhage with the common factor of all having been given the AZ jab - alarm bells should be going off at any competent regulator given that situation. It may just be terrible luck, but there's every chance that there is something wrong and should rightly be investigated

And far more people will die from Covid if the vaccines are stopped than any death toll from blood clots.

As discussed in the general vaccine thread in the covid subforum, it's an ethically messy situation for the regulators to find themselves in. They (mostly) are all still saying that the benefits outweigh the risks, but a regulator that willingly authorises a vaccine that is causing harm to healthy people is not going to be a popular one for very long

 

[Horizon22]

If you look at it in terms of numbers of cases presenting, then yes, it would all appear fine (particularly when you start lumping together all AZ that has been injected)

However when you look at it from the other end, where (taking just Norway, as an example of a country who are IMO right to take the action they have) - 3 severe blood clots in young patients who you wouldn't expect them in, and a fatality from a brain haemorrhage with the common factor of all having been given the AZ jab - alarm bells should be going off at any competent regulator given that situation. It may just be terrible luck, but there's every chance that there is something wrong and should rightly be investigated

Only the WHO and JCVI have said there is zero evidence and many countries have said they have halted it due to an "abundance of caution" or words to that effect. For whatever reason several countries weren't keen on using it anyway, and have no found a good reason to halt. You can pick anything out with a large enough of sample size and statistics to prove a point. What matters is the overall data.

If I was particularly cynical - and some have suggested - its because the numbers of AZ have been further reduced so the stocks in each country aren't high anyway so there's no major harm in reducing the vaccine.

This appears more political than medical - Italy's medical director has even stated this. No fan of this government, and believe Brexit will gradually leave us all poorer, but rates are rising / remaining flat across Europe and decreasingly rapidly in the UK due to a successful roll out (primarily due to the NHS I will say, not the government!)

By all means lets look at the data, but complete suspensions is rather kneejerk.

 

[21C101]

Only the WHO and JCVI have said there is zero evidence and many countries have said they have halted it due to an "abundance of caution" or words to that effect.

If they have a position of responsibility in the sort of place that puts geologists on trial for failing to predict an earthquake they are going to be over cautious.

 

[najaB]

Bilge. All the large EU states except Germany had higher debt to GDP rates than the UK before Coronavirus hit.

Meanwhile, back in reality, 2019 debt to GDP ratios:

Greece	200.2
Italy	154.5
Portugal	135.9
United States	134.6
France	124.0
Belgium	120.2
Spain	117.3
United Kingdom	117.2
Canada	106.7
Austria	88.9
Hungary	83.2
Colombia	82.7
Slovenia	80.9
Australia	75.7
Finland	69.6
Ireland	68.8
Germany	68.2
Poland	63.4
Slovak Republic	63.4
Netherlands	62.5
Mexico	59.3
Sweden	55.4
Denmark	51.4
Latvia	47.2
Norway	46.7
Lithuania	44.5
Switzerland	41.0
Czech Republic	37.7
Chile	37.2
Turkey	34.8
Luxembourg	30.0
Estonia	13.4

Source: https://data.oecd.org/gga/general-government-debt.htm

 

[class ep-09]

The blood clot levels in those who had the Astra vaccine is rather lower than the typical blood clot rate for the general population.

Still, Europes loss is the Commonwealths gain.


No it hasn't. There is a requirement in the protocol for checks to be proportionate to the risk being mitigate. The checks are manifestly disproportionate, hence the UK is well within its rights to act.

That will be decided by European Court of Justice to which BoJo signet up to ( irony is it not?)

It also is going to be decided by international community , especially US , which is not in favour BoJo, brexit and even more UK breaking Goof Friday Agreement .

If UK is established or perceived to break agreements - sweet goodbye to any FTA’s
.
No trading block or a country will trust UK for long time.

Bilge. All the large EU states except Germany had higher debt to GDP rates than the UK before Coronavirus hit.

https://mobile.twitter.com/PoliticsForAlI/status/1371766682302156804

Laughable - most of EU countries have GDP to debt ratio much better than UK , including most of Eastern ( sorry Central ) Europe .

 

[Horizon22]

Laughable - most of EU countries have GDP to debt ratio much better than UK , including most of Eastern ( sorry Central ) Europe .

You got a source to back that up, considering najaB does?

 

[class ep-09]

You got a source to back that up, considering najaB does?

Is that enough ?

Country List Government Debt to GDP | Europe

This page displays a table with actual values, consensus figures, forecasts, statistics and historical data charts for - Country List Government Debt to GDP. This page provides values for Government Debt to GDP reported in several countries part of Europe. The table has current values for...

tradingeconomics.com

 

[Horizon22]

Is that enough ?

Country List Government Debt to GDP | Europe

This page displays a table with actual values, consensus figures, forecasts, statistics and historical data charts for - Country List Government Debt to GDP. This page provides values for Government Debt to GDP reported in several countries part of Europe. The table has current values for...

tradingeconomics.com

Which puts the UK in 4th, backing up the point you're trying to disprove entirely haha.

 

[Typhoon]

Which puts the UK in 4th, backing up the point you're trying to disprove entirely haha.

I'm not certain about that, they seem to be making the same point

Laughable - most of EU countries have GDP to debt ratio much better than UK , including most of Eastern ( sorry Central ) Europe .

The two lists have obviously been devised in slightly different ways but, if you extract the non-European countries, the order is pretty much the same.

Reading the rest of #2035, the sentiments are similar. For instance:

That will be decided by European Court of Justice to which BoJo signet up to ( irony is it not?)

If UK is established or perceived to break agreements - sweet goodbye to any FTA’s

 

[Horizon22]

I'm not certain about that, they seem to be making the same point

Yes exactly, @class ep-09 was trying to suggest that the UK had a relatively low rate and then linked to a source which was the opposite to what he claimed.