Professor John Robertson OBA
Jackie Baillie, Labour Unhealthy Spokesperson, in the terminally-ill Scotsman yesterday, with the above claim.
From BBC Health last week and being broadcast widely and frequently:
Flu strikes every winter, but this year something seems to be different. A seasonal flu virus suddenly mutated in the summer. It appears to evade some of our immunity, has kick-started a flu season more than a month early, and is a type of flu that history suggests is more severe.
The NHS has now issued a “flu jab SOS” as fears grow that this will add up to a brutal winter. There is a lot of nuance and uncertainty, but leading flu experts have told me they would not be shocked if this was the worst flu season for a decade. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2dr8gzdz1wo
BBC UK has a link to the story but BBC Scotland does not.
Important information is not being communicated.
First, availability in England – you can get the free NHS flu vaccine if you:
- are aged 65 or over (including those who will be 65 by 31 March 2026)
- have certain long-term health conditions
- are pregnant
- live in a care home
- are the main carer for an older or disabled person, or receive a carer’s allowance
- live with someone who has a weakened immune system
Source: https://www.nhs.uk/vaccinations/flu-vaccine/
In Scotland, significantly wider free availability is in place
This includes:
- those aged 65 and over (on or before 31 March 2025)
- those aged 18 to 64 with an eligible health condition (as defined in the chapter 19 of the Green Book)
- those who are pregnant
- those living in a long-stay residential care home or other long-stay care facility
- those living with someone who has a weakened immune system
- an unpaid or young carer
- a frontline health or social care worker
- a non-frontline NHS worker
- a poultry worker or bird handler
- an asylum seeker living in a Home Office hotel or B&B accommodation
- those experiencing homelessness
- those experiencing substance misuse
- those living in a Scottish prison
Second, uptake-levels in key groups are already significantly lower in key >65 group in England.
For 2024-2025, early trends show Scotland with stronger uptake among over-65s (71.6% vs. England’s ~60-65% estimated based on historical patterns) – multiple sources at: https://x.com/i/grok?conversation=1987603360061788291
Third and perhaps most indicative of the risk is the number of doses given and the contrast is shocking.
NHS Scotland has given 927 000 doses so far:
All things being equal, we might expect the figure in England to be around 9.27 million but it was only 4.3million:
So, less than half the Scottish uptake per capita, in England, reflecting the wider free availability, above.
Has any journalist in Scotland noticed this?
Talking-up Scotland 'Albatraz' 
Damn Jaikie Baillie was honoured by Westminster for …what ?
She is certainly not a harbinger of peace and tranquility with her constant Rev. I M Jolly demeanor bemoaning everything and anything that has not been excreted from the ar*e of Sarwar , her fellow gloom-monger .
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At least the Rev I.M. Jolly was funny.
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