Readers' Letters: NHS Inform jags booking system is imperfect

Mairianna Clyde is very certain that the letters from NHS Inform will contain the correct information (Letters, 26 October). As someone who did manage to get both jags last Saturday in a very inconvenient venue, which was empty at the time we went, might I respectfully inform her that, though the booking system is being improved all the time, we only went to Ingleston on a Saturday night because we were assured that city centre vaccination sites were so full there was little chance of Covid boosts before Christmas.

People with weakened immune systems may be offered a third dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, so the booster would be their fourth jag (Picture: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

It was at Ingleston we learned that there is a difference between a third jag and a boost, a fact not made clear in your article “Analysis: Is the Covid 19 booster vaccine programme on track?” (26 October).

Nor does your article make clear the chaotic nature of the early roll-out of the programme, with letters sent out too early, with totally inappropriate destinations for an aged part of the population and a lack of information for precisely those least likely to be online (eg availability of flu jags at pharmacies, the necessity of the Covid boost coming at least six months after the second vaccination, the ever-changing nature and complexities of the booking system).

One thing we did learn at Ingleston was how flexible, welcoming and professional the delivery end of the system is.

I wonder what advice Ms Clyde would give to the lady I have twice met who received a flu vaccination letter which sent her to a very inconvenient centre in Gorebridge, whose second Covid vaccination was certainly before mine but, like two other people of my acquaintance, has been told she doesn’t exist?

Marina Donald, Edinburgh

Still waiting

I am glad to read that Mairianna Clyde has put our minds at rest revealing that a look at NHS Inform and all will be well. I am 81 and had my second jag in the middle of March but still await word of my booster.

I wonder how many more over-80s are in the same situation?

Tony McLaren, Newtongrange, Midlothian

Answers & Greta

It is not fashionable to offer criticism of Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg. Yet I have noticed recently that some of her public statements seem to amount to a celebration of protest for its own sake.

Sooner or later the glamour and camaraderie of large marches like the planned 6 November Global Day for Justice rally has to give way to the harsh, expedient world of actual decision making (your report, 27 October).

Among other things, that rally, in the middle of the COP 26 summit, will call for zero carbon emissions. That is hardly feasible given the various interest groups that need to be brought together. Net zero means achieving balance between the carbon emitted into the atmosphere and the carbon removed from it. That is feasible, although on what time scale is a cause for great argument.

In terms of practical public policy the COP26 summit should have three objectives: legally binding agreements on how each individual country can reduce its emissions by 2030; a consensus on how the world as a whole can reach net zero by 2050; a pledge of at least $100 billion to ensure developing countries can reduce their own emissions.

That will require tough negotiation, vision, as well as some thought given to how guarantees given can be monitored. Activists have the right to call out empty rhetoric from politicians and statesmen but, equally, the broader public can see that street campaigning has to give way eventually to talk around a table followed by effective action.

Ms Thunberg and her colleagues can play an important role to help ensure that promises made are kept. They will be less relevant if they persist with unrealistic proposals backed by little more than cynicism and abuse.

Bob Taylor, Glenrothes, Fife

A simple fact

In her letter in yesterday’s Scotsman Catriona C Clark gives vent to her anger about Scotland being deprived of its “rightful place” at COP26.

Scotland is still part of the UK, and there are no separate representations for Wales, Northern Ireland, nor England.

EP Carruthers, Lockerbie, Dumfries & Galloway

Orinoco woe

I had a little chuckle at David Bone’s letter “Wombling Free” (27 October), in which he suggests that the Wombles would make a suitable delegation to the COP26 conference in Glasgow, if only to clear up the backlog of rubbish left lying around in the streets there, and yet to be exacerbated by a bin collection strike, incidentally supported by Greta Thunberg.

Unfortunately, the Wombles are not real, and will therefore not be able to help. They are fictional characters from a children’s television series, and even then, they constrain themselves to Wimbledon in London. The rubbish in Glasgow and the estimated 1.3 million rats are real, and we cannot wish either away that easily. Both are the responsibility of the council in Glasgow, who are trying to blame a woman who died ten years ago for their problems.

If this doesn’t work in trying to deflect the issue, then no doubt their council leader will try to blame those London- based Wombles, who could have come up to help out, but have chosen not to.

Obviously, this is further evidence of UK institutions failing to work for Scotland. I am sure you can fill in the rest of the press release for yourself. Here we have in perfect summary the state of politics in Scotland today.

Victor Clements, Aberfeldy, Perthshire

Sinking feeling

In the midst of the COP 26 fever now rising in Glasgow, here in Edinburgh we should not forget the dangers we now face from global warming causing rising sea levels, storm surge and flooding, especially as the Greenland ice sheet continues to melt.

No actions appear to have been undertaken to protect the Forth Estuary, despite the fact sea levels are seen to be rising. There are many vulnerable low-lying areas along the Forth, not forgetting the food warehouses and industrial hub at Grangemouth which employs more than 50,000 people.

Recent heavy rainfall has also shown the sewerage run off and flooding in and around Edinburgh miserably unable to cope, exposing its antiquated systems designed for very different times.

Not only does our capital city deserve better. We need a Scotland-wide strategy to protect our critical installations and expedite the design, planning and finance needed to build a robust new flood prevention infrastructure. This should provide an integrated flood and sewerage defence plan to offset the massive and continuous Arctic ice melt now in progress. The Dutch have provided flood defences and sea walls at Rotterdam in the belief that there is now an unstoppable seven metre sea level rise as global warming proceeds apace. Nothing has happened to gainsay this belief.

Scotland is hosting the UN COP 26 meeting on global warming, now the Scottish Government needs to put words into action to alleviate its consequences before it is too late.

Elizabeth Marshall, Edinburgh

Enough alarms

There are so many downsides of COP26 that one wonders why it's being held at all. It will create a Covid hotspot, act as a magnet for eco-disrupters, is a terrorist target, will draw thousands of police and security people away from vital tasks, cost a fortune and greatly disrupt the life of Glasgow. In addition it will spread fear among our young people through lurid predictions of climate disaster. The last of these downsides will have the longest lasting effect.

Sir David Attenborough warned this week that “if we don't act now it will be too late”. What's new? In 1989 the UN stated that “entire nations could be wiped off the face of the earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed by 2000”. In 2006 Al Gore warned “we have less than ten years to make dramatic changes in our global warming pollution”. In March 2009 Prince Charles claimed "we have less than 100 months to alter our behaviour before we risk catastrophic climate change".

This alarmism, similar to the predictions of nuclear Armageddon in the 1980s, is based on speculation and is in danger of creating a generation of young people who fear for their future. It must stop.

William Loneskie, Lauder, Berwickshire

Up and atom

The aim of COP26 is to reduce CO2 emissions. Yet representatives from the nuclear industry – nuclear power has no CO2 emissions – have been excluded.

If they really believed the end of the world was nigh due to CO2, surely the environmental and climate people would have been clamouring for a nuclear programme long ago to save us all?

The environmental cult clearly has a secret agenda if they have persuaded COP to ignore nuclear power.

Malcolm Parkin, Kinnesswood, Kinross, Perth & Kinross

Winds of change

Calum Miller's letter (27 October) details the sham of pushing renewables for 20 years and neglecting nuclear energy.

No matter how much this SNP/Green coalition sticks to its renewables (mostly onshore and offshore wind) there will never be enough energy generated to satisfy the National Grid and to keep the lights on.

Like it or lump it, we have to go down the nuclear route. We have all the expertise at Dounreay to be able to produce the nuclear power that would entirely make all the wind turbines redundant.

Nuclear power is both clean and green and is 100 per cent reliable 24/7 unlike that produced by wìnd.

Michael Baird, Bonar Bridge, Highland

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