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Happy 2025?
The approach of the five year anniversary of the start of the Covid-19 pandemic provides an opportunity to reflect on the previous year and look forward to the new. In my blog post Happy 2024 I called for far more proactive public health communication about the dangers posed by Covid-19 and better preparedness for the Continue reading
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The Covid Inquiry: Reflections on the Healthcare Module
The final hearing of the longest module of the Covid Inquiry, module 3, took place on 28 November 2024. This part of the Inquiry covering healthcare in England, Scotland, Wales and Norther Ireland, heard from 96 witnesses in total, and considered nearly quarter of a million pages of evidence. It has been a rollercoaster ten Continue reading
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Further Narrowing of Entitlement to Covid-19 Vaccines proposed
Yesterday the Joint Committee on Vaccines and Immunisation (JCVI) set out proposals for who will be entitled to a free Covid-19 vaccine booster in 2025 and 2026. Whist entitlements to the spring booster remains largely unchanged, there is a very significant proposed narrowing of who will be able to get a vaccine booster in Autumn Continue reading
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UK Heath and Security Agency (UKHSA) Make up the data!
On Thursday 10 October the UKHSA announced plans for a series of weekly updated graphs about so called ‘winter viruses’, based on data that is already available. So far so good – there is nothing wrong with presenting data more clearly in graphic form. Except it was not OK. The post has now been removed Continue reading
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Covid-19 Autumn Booster Campaign
My previous post, Submission to the Treasury on forthcoming budget and spending review was highly critical of the plans for the 2024 Covid-19 Autumn booster campaign, particularly the further narrowing of entitlement to a free vaccine, including the exclusion of informal carers and household members of the clinically vulnerable. However, one of the issues that Continue reading
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The UK Covid Inquiry – Public Hearings
On 9 September public hearings resume with hearings on module 3 on healthcare systems. This module will cover the following very pertinent issues: This module will consider the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on healthcare systems in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. This will include consideration of the healthcare consequences of how the governments Continue reading
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Submission to the Treasury on Forthcoming Budget and Spending Review
The UK Treasury is running a public consultation about the forthcoming budget and government spending priorities. I have taken the opportunity to submit a piece on the case for extending entitlement to free Covid-19 boosters and the need to address the high rates of Covid-19 that are continuing to cause disruption across the UK all Continue reading
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How to Avoid Catching Covid
This blog is a revised and updated version of my previous blog on this subject which was published May 2023. The vast majority of the population of the UK have had at least one confirmed or suspected Covid infection. This reflects the fact that governments and authorities have allowed the virus to rip by failing Continue reading
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BBC article on ‘Is there a summer covid wave’ – complaint
The BBC struck again on Sunday 30 June with an article on their news website about the current Covid wave. This has much in common with previous BBC articles, except it does not mention the previous BBC stance that Covid is now a routine winter virus. But I guess that publishing this in the UK Continue reading
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Summer Wave 2024
Whilst politicians, the media and the UK Health and Security Agency (UKHSA) continue to pretend that Covid-19 is now a seasonal illness that strikes in late Autumn and Winter, the UK, in common with many other countries, now seems to be entering the second significant wave of infections of spring/early summer 2024. This blog provides Continue reading
GILLIAN SMITH About Me
I am a semi retired social researcher and have previously held a number of senior social research positions in Whitehall Departments. See an interview with me here. I live in a London suburb with my husband who has suffered multiple serious illnesses over the last few years. I myself am living with MND.
This series of blogs represent a personal, evidence based perspective based on living in the UK at a time when we are all meant to be ‘living with COVID’. Although I am a social scientist by training, I have worked closely with people from different disciplines throughout my career in order to present a complete picture of the evidence on specific policy issues. I am therefore scientifically literate but where I quote evidence based on research beyond my particular expertise it is always validated with relevant experts. I am a member of the Clinically Vulnerable Families group, though please note that the information presented here and any views expressed are my own. We are a friendly, supportive group and can be found via Facebook in private mode or in public mode via X (formerly twitter) Or BlueSky.Social
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Living on Plague Island 