Tayside councillor in vaccine trials at Ninewells

A TAYSIDE politician has volunteered for the local Covid-19 vaccine trial.

Alasdair Bailey decided to put himself forward to see if he could “help speed up the process of developing this vaccine.”

He said he was “pleasantly surprised” when he was invited to the Clinical Research Centre at Ninewells Hospital to see if he would be a suitable candidate.

The Carse of Gowrie Labour member was then selected and given an injection.

The vaccine being trialled by the Tayside team is by Belgian pharmaceutical company Janssen – a subsidiary of Johnson and Johnson.

The Tayside team is seeking to recruit 400 participants. It is the only Scottish site of the 17 UK sites trialling the Janssen vaccine.

A total of 6000 participants are being sought in the UK and 30,000 globally.

Mr Bailey documented his experience of taking part in the trial in a video to show how the process works.

He said: “I’ve never participated in any medical research but I thought I should put myself forward for this one given the enormity of the challenge that we face in getting vaccines ready in timescales never previously attempted.”

He will return in a couple of months’ time for the booster injection and be monitored by the trials team.

Speaking immediately after the vaccination, he said: “Nothing untoward, nothing concerning. It was a really nice appointment and a really nice wee bit of the hospital here at Ninewells.”

“What’s important is that I have made myself helpful to the people who are developing this vaccine.”

A spokesperson for Dundee University said they were still encouraging people to come forward to get as broad a cross-section of the population as possible.

Anyone interested should email their details to tay.vaccinetrial@nhs. scot.