The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Who said it
“I don’t know which vaccine I will get offered, but if I am offered the AstraZeneca vaccine I will take the AstraZeneca vaccine and I will not have any hesitation in doing so”
- First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.
“Somehow I seem to have gone viral and to say I am overwhelmed is an understatement indeed. I don’t quite know how it has happened or what we have unleashed but I am completely bemused!”
- Alan Melinek, 85, from Watford, whose piano playing has been viewed hundreds of thousands of times on TikTok.
“Despite what has happened to Neil and the impact on our family, I still strongly believe that people should go ahead and have the vaccine. If you’ve had one dose, go ahead and have your second. If you haven’t had your dose yet make sure that you do. Because, overall, we will save more lives by people having the vaccine than not”
Alison Astles, whose brother, Neil Astles, 59, died of a blood clot on Sunday after getting the AstraZeneca vaccine on March 17.
“Something like 30 or 40 people drown in the bath every year, something like 1,000 people die falling down the stairs, something like 200 die from choking on their breakfast, and that’s many, many more deaths than we get from these vaccines so actually taking the vaccine is actually one of the safer things you do in the day, it’s definitely safer than cycling or driving to work. So these are incredibly rare events” Government scientific adviser Professor Stephen Reicher, a member of the Scientific Pandemic Insights Group on Behaviours.
On this day
1626: Francis Bacon, philosopher and statesman, died – he apparently caught a chill after trying to stuff snow into a chicken.
1838: The National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, London, was opened.
1906: Labour politician Hugh Gaitskell was born in London.
1969: The first British-built Concorde 002 made its maiden flight from Filton to RAF Fairford.
1983: Jenny Pitman became the first woman to train an English Grand National winner with Corbiere.
1991: Georgia declared independence from the Soviet Union.
2003: Baghdad fell to American forces, Iraqis pulled down a statue of former leader Saddam Hussein.
2005: The Prince of Wales married Camilla Parker Bowles in a civil ceremony at Windsor’s Guildhall.
ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: Gay rights pioneer Phyllis Lyon, who was among the first same-sex couples to marry in California when it became legal to do so in 2008, died at her San Francisco home aged 95.