VAX JUST NOT FAIR All UK adults to be offered jab by July 31
Anger as Covid jab deal means nurses getting paid £13 an hour will train vaccinators – who’ll get paid £66 an hour
A nurse has accused the Scottish Government of “spitting” on her profession by paying dental hyg i e n i s t s, optometrists and doctors five times more for giving vaccinations.
Jane McCallum has criticised a deal struck by ministers in November which allows NHS boards to give contractors £ 230 per three-and-a-half-hour shift – the equivalent of £ 66 per hour – at inoculation centres.
Genera l pract ice nurses, meanwhile, are receiving as little as £13 an hour to do exactly the same job while often having to train the rookie vaccinators.
Jane, 64, an experienced practice and travel health nurse who is vaccinating people at Edinburgh’s Queen Margaret Un i v e r s i t y Hospital, s a id: “Thi s discrepancy in pay for getting everyone v a c c i na t e d is an insult to the nursing profession.
“Nurses have been told we’re doing a wonderful job in t he pandemic but this feels like being spat on.
“I was working a longside a dental hygienist who had never done it before so I taught her how to vaccinate. Yet she was getting paid many times more than me.”
Some contractors who are understood to have never injected patients before are earning more than £920 for working 14-hour shifts – a rate that is supposed to cover travel and food expenses. But nurses are earning a fraction of that while incurring the same costs.
Jane added: “Our nurses finish a shift having earned around £100 while others with hardly any experience can walk out with almost £ 1000 – and that’s for vaccinating far fewer people.
“W hat ’s the Scottish Government going t o do about this apparent error of judgement? Inspire another clap in the street?
“We hear it said the pandemic is like a war effort but it doesn’t feel like that when some people are making so much money from the NHS through the need to vaccinate the country urgently.
“There should be a standard rate to vaccinate – whoever you are. We are in crisis and there should be equal pay for equal work
“Can Scotland’s NHS really afford these rates of pay when some people are waiting years for a hip replacement?
“This is causing great unrest on the front lines among what should be a feeling of a mutually supportive team pulling together. The morale of NHS nurses is being put in serious jeopardy.”
Health Secretary Jeane Freeman announced last month the country would need 3400 vaccinators and Government officials insisted it was
“vital” as many health and social care staff as possible joined the effort.
But the Royal College of Nursing Scotland and opposition politicians have criticised discrepancies in pay rates.
Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said: “Our dedicated NHS nurses have the skill and experience to be at the forefront of Scotland’s vaccine delivery.
“It is understandable they would
Britain’s war against Covid got a huge boost last night with the news all adults should have been vaccinated by July 31.
A major acceleration of the rollout was announced by PM Boris Johnson, who vowed every adult – 52.8million – will have been invited to have the jab two months ahead of schedule.
It raises hopes that the worst of lockdown could soon be over and the country can, finally, get back to some kind of normal.
Johnson said: “I want to see the rollout go further and faster in the coming weeks.
“We will now aim to offer a jab to every adult by the end of July, helping us protect the most vulnerable sooner, and take further steps to ease some of the restrictions in place.”
He also promised all over-50s – and those at risk with underlying health conditions – will have been invited to have the jab by April 15.
That is a month early for the over-50s. The rest of the adult population, some 21million, will follow on with the last jabbed by July 31.
The news was greeted by leaders across travel, hospitality and retail.
Patricia Yates, of Visit Britain, said:
“Really good news to start getting life returning, including holidays.”
Emma Coulthurst, of price comparison site TravelSupermarket, said: “We’ve seen the tide turning. It’s given people hope that some form of safelycontrolled overseas travel will be able to take place.”
Under the PM’s roadmap out of lockdown, social mixing is scheduled to return in limited numbers by Easter, with the prospect of holidays later in the year.
The success of the vaccination programme – 17.2million Brits have now had the first dose – has triggered a new optimism in the fight to defeat the virus.
The rollout will go hand-in-hand with a ramped-up test and trace operation.
The Government’s 50-page “cautious and phased” roadmap will be discussed by the Downing Street Covid Committee today.
The vaccination speed-up was welcomed by Labour but shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: “We now urgently need the Government to set out how they will prioritise those outside the first nine groups.”