Forget the Oxford jab — let’s ban Lemsip!

Good news at last. My second jab has successfully negotiated the speed cameras on the M4 and the lane closures on the Surrey section of the M25. Provided the dartford Tunnel is behaving itself and there are no emergency roadworks at the M11 interchange, it should arrive in North London next Friday.

It’s been a long time coming, via a pharmacy in Reading and a clinic in Raynes Park, but the chequered flag is in sight.

oK, it’s the same ‘killer’ oxford AstraZeneca vaccine which gave me the horrors first time round, but I’m prepared to take my chances.

In fact, as of first thing next Friday morning you’ll find me banging on the surgery door like Fred Flintstone, sleeve rolled up in readiness.

Fortunately, I’m far too old to have to worry about the remote possibility of the jab causing potentially fatal blood clots.

But even if I did fall into the ‘at risk’ under-30 age group — or ‘cohort’ as we must now call it — I think, on balance, I’d bite the bullet.

despite the Government’s lily- livered determination to keep us all locked down for as long as possible, mass vaccination is the only way we’re ever going to escape the nightmare of the past 13 months.

Yet still the usual siren voices are attempting to scare us rigid. Their latest worst case scenario is hyping-up the unproven link between the oxford vaccine and an extremely rare condition known as CVST which, when combined with something called thrombocytopenia, can cause clots on the brain.

Nope, me neither. I thought Thrombocytopenia was a movie starring Phil daniels, Leslie Ash and Sting. Forgive me for sounding flippant. But the clinical science behind all this sent my head spinning.

And, as the Mail reported yesterday, the jury is still out on the alleged link. There have been four cases and one death for every one million vaccines administered. The World Health organisation says the link is ‘plausible’ but ‘not confirmed’. Even so, most people have got more chance of being killed in a road accident.

So why seize on it to induce yet another wave of panic? Yes, thrombocytopenia is a recognised blood disorder which can lead to clotting. Those under-30s most at risk are being offered an alternative jab, which is probably only sensible under the circumstances.

But inevitably, the avalanche of hysterical adverse publicity— especially on TV — is bound to frighten others into refusing the AZ vaccine. Ministers and their tame ‘experts’ are busily trying to persuade us that the jab’s safe.

But given they have spent the past year fanning the flames of fear and paranoia, there will be plenty of Nervous Nellies unwilling to trust them.

With the AstraZeneca jab already considered unsuitable for the under-30s, it’s probably only a matter of time before the contagion spreads to older age groups.

The next thing you know, no one will want the oxford vaccine. There’s no logic to any of this.

In fact, you might as well ban Lemsip.

Now before you think I’ve completely taken leave of my senses, allow me to refer to an email I received this week from Mail reader Findlay McClymont, from Sunninghill, Berkshire.

After reading about the potentially fatal side-effects of the AstraZeneca jab, he decided to inspect the contents of his medicine cabinet. Everything you buy from the chemist these days comes with a chunky leaflet detailing correct dosage and safety information. No one ever reads it.

But increasingly litigious Britain is getting like the U.S., where everything from aspirins to haemorrhoid cream comes with a terrifying catalogue of warnings, designed to ward off lawsuits.

The first product Findlay checked out was a box of Lemsip Max Cold and Flu Blackcurrant.

There, along with the usual caveats explaining that Lemsip can cause headache, vomiting, higher blood pressure, increased heart rate, insomnia, skin allergies etc, he discovered that the sideeffects can also include:

‘Blood disorders, such as thrombocytopenia (a reduction in blood platelets which may make you bruise or bleed more easily) . . .’

So Lemsip, a widely used overthe-counter cough and cold treatment, carries at least one of the risks of the oxford Covid jab.

FUNNILY enough, I don’t recall Sky News or the BBC devoting much airtime to the dangers of Lemsip. It would be unfair to single out Lemsip, which most of us consider perfectly harmless.

Many well-known treatments can induce thrombocytopenia, including statins, ibruprofen and penicillin. If you heeded all the small print, you’d never take any medicine. Everything in life carries some measure of risk. Just like the oxford jab, sometimes the benefits far outweigh the dangers.

Take erectile dysfunction remedies, for instance. A few years ago a friend of mine, then in his late Sixties, was bitterly disappointed when his GP refused to prescribe him Viagra. ‘It’s for your own good,’ the doctor told him. ‘ You’ve got dangerously high blood pressure and a dicky heart. Haven’t you read the side-effects?’

‘of course I have, that’s why I want to try it. I’ve always fancied having a four-hour erection.’