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Are we in for another lockdown?
It depends on who you ask.
State chief medical officer Tony Holohan all but ruled it out on Wednesday during a National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet) briefing with reassuring comments that were largely echoed by the Taoiseach the following morning.
By Thursday afternoon, Tánaiste Leo Varadkar was saying that nobody could rule it out, although he felt it could be avoided. Then we had David Nabarro, the WHO’s special envoy on Covid-19, expressing concern at our seven-day moving average and saying local restrictions may be needed if the upward trajectory continues.
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Modelling around the future course of coronavirus is uncertain. And the truth is no one can say with certainty that the situation will not explode in a way that may require regional restrictions, or worse.
Holohan said this week while the disease is “growing at a rate that is concerning”, it is not too late to turn a corner. The striking aspect of this statement is that 12 months ago the country was in the middle of almost the exact same debate.
Articles from late October 2020 quote Holohan as warning that it was too early to say if Ireland had turned a corner for the better after a concerning spike in cases.
People could certainly be forgiven for feeling like it’s groundhog day when the headlines are the same a year later, but as we are reminded frequently, the big difference between 2020 and 2021 is vaccinations.
Vaccine up-take rates
The mix of the reopening of nightclubs, speculation about another lockdown and constant reminders about vaccinations making a difference has put the spotlight on one group: the unvaccinated. To that end it was welcome to learn that the Government is considering a campaign on vaccinations to reach communities who do not speak English.
Vaccine-uptake rates for Irish nationals stood at 90 per cent, compared to 44 per cent among central and eastern European immigrant communities, according to Central Statistics Office figures published on Thursday.
Among 18- to 24-year-olds from central and eastern Europe, vaccination rates were only 36 per cent.
These are eye-catching statistics but what is notable is the lack of focus on the younger age group more generally; and the lack of awareness at a senior political level about reasons why young people in Ireland might choose not to get vaccinated.
Research carried out by polling company Ipsos MRBI for the Irish Pharmaceutical Healthcare Association found that vaccine hesitancy among young people is almost double that of the general population.
Low risk of becoming ill
In the general population, 4 per cent are unsure about taking a vaccine but within the 18- to 34-year-old age group the figure is running at twice this, the highest level of any age group. There are about 1.2 million people in this age group.
Some politicians, speaking privately, have posited the theory that some younger people are not getting vaccinated because they view themselves as being at a low risk of becoming ill.
What this ignores is the place where many younger people increasingly live their lives – and that is online.
On Instagram and TikTok, conspiracy theories have spread like wildfire. In one video seen millions of times this summer and which made its way from Instagram to the private WhatsApp groups of young Irish women, an American woman in her 20s trembles and cries while an unknown person records her. Later she posts another video, a montage of medical clips set against emotional music, about her seizures and lack of ability to walk. She blames her neurological symptoms on getting a first dose of the vaccine months previously.
Countless other videos of a similar ilk began appearing: young women saying they suddenly couldn’t walk any more or who claimed they were subjected to a life of uncontrollable seizures. What many of these videos have in common is that they are linked to GoFundMe pages.
GoFundMe has said that anti-vaxxers are banned from fundraising using their platform but some people are still making tens of thousands, while claiming they have had significant adverse reactions.
Despite the lack of credibility around many of these claims, they have influenced a large number of young people who consume much of their information through social media rather than traditional news sources which have standards of verification.
Get a grasp
The vast majority of younger people have decided, regardless of what they have seen online, to go and get vaccinated. Yet the figures released this week show there are still many who are hesitant.
There is an onus on politicians at a senior level to get a grasp on this particularly if Covid-19 shots are to become a regular feature in our lives.
It is not enough to extend the use of vaccination certs indefinitely and hope the lure of nightclubs or pubs will be enough to convince this group of younger people. For the sake of wider society (not to mention the economy) the public health imperative should be getting under the bonnet in terms of the causes of vaccine hesitancy and tackling it head on instead of the endless and circular debates about lockdowns.