4.31am EST
04:31
Javid insists Omicron threat serious even though no confirmed deaths from it in England yet
Here are some more lines from what Sajid Javid said about Omicron and the booster jabs rollout in his morning interviews.
Javid, the health secretary, said that he could not confirm that anyone has died from the Omicron variant in England. There are about 10 people in hospital with the variant, he said. But he dismissed claims this meant it was not a threat. “There is always a lag between infection and then hospitalisation and then, sadly, death,” he told Sky News. He also pointed out that a huge rise in infections would lead to more people going to hospital, even if most cases were mild.
He said it “should not be the case” that people die because they can’t get treatment on the NHS during the Covid booster drive. On Times Radio he was asked: “Will anyone sadly die because they can’t get the treatment they need in the NHS?” Javid replied:
Well, that certainly should not be the case at all because as well as focusing on this, there will be a focus on any urgent need and any, of course, emergency care.
He said that he was personally responsible for the success of the booster rollout programme. He was responding to a question on the Today programme about who was in charge given that Maggie Throup, the vaccines minister, does not seeem to have the clout of her predecessor, Nadhim Zahawi, who attended cabinet.
He said he thought people should go ahead and spend Christmas with family and friends, but that they should be cautious too. He was planning to see family, he said. But he said when he was entertaining friends at home this weekend, he asked them to take a lateral flow test first.
He said it was “completely unfair” to suggest the AstraZeneca vaccine was not as good as once thought in the light of evidence last week suggesting two doses offer very little protection against Omicron. He said AstraZeneca had “played a phenomenal role in protecting our country”.
4.01am EST
04:01
Javid says GPs and hospitals to postpone non-urgent appointments to help booster jabs rollout
Good morning. Boris Johnson has set a target for the government to offer all adults a booster vaccine by the end of the month. Here is our overnight story reporting the announcement.
This morning Sajid Javid, the health secretary, has been giving broadcast interviews, and he has admitted that, as GPs and hospitals in England focus on this target over the next few weeks, non-urgent appointments will be postponed. He told the Today programme:
It does mean that, when it comes to primary care, for the next couple of weeks that our GPs will only be focusing on urgent needs and vaccinations. And it also means that non-urgent appointments and elective surgeries may have to be postponed into the new year.
Javid insisted that this would not affect people wanting to see a doctor about cancer symptoms. That would count as an urgent appointment, he said.
Asked what hospital appointments might be postponed, Javid replied:
It will be anyone who’s got some elective surgery planned, for example, that can be postponed until the new year. So that might mean, for example, a knee operation or hip operation, something that sadly someone has probably been waiting [for] for a long time in any case, but the hospital concerned would have the right to postpone it if it meant they would get a lot more booster jabs done.
Javid said these decisions were “not easy”. But there was limited capacity in the NHS.
Asked if this would mean people dying who would not have died if these appointments had not been posptponed, Javid said: “What will lead to real harm is if we don’t do this.”
I will post more from his interviews shortly.
Here is the agenda for the day.
Morning: Boris Johnson is visiting a vaccination centre, where he is expected to give a TV interview.
11.30am: Downing Street holds its lobby briefing.
3.30pm: Sajid Javid, the health secretary, is expected to make a statement to MPs about the vaccine booster programme.
4pm: Antonia Romeo, permanent secretary at the Ministry of Justice, gives evidence to the Commons public accounts committee about the courts backlog.
4.30pm: Max Hill QC, director of public prosecutions, gives evidence to the Commons home affairs committee about rape prosecutions.
Also today Liz Truss, the foreign secretary, will be meeting foreign ministers from the Balkans.
I will be largely focusing on UK Covid-related issues today, but there is much more coverage on our global Covid live blog.
I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.
If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter. I’m on @AndrewSparrow.
Alternatively, you can email me at andrew.sparrow@theguardian.com
Updated
at 4.24am EST
