‘Even if you get five people vaccinated, that’s five people who won’t suffer’ Nigel Jones spent 11 years in the Army and now works in the ambulance service near Abergavenny. During the pandemic, he’s been working as a Re:Act responder
Working for the ambulance service, I saw the effects of Covid-19 during the first wave – almost every patient we took in was ill with the virus. I was part of the Re:Act Disaster Response team who stepped up to help. The NHS was under the cosh at the time and I was part of the RE:ACT Disaster Response team who stepped up to help.
I helped build the Nightingale hospitals in Wales and also worked with the local council in Hereford to distribute PPE. Now I’m at the pop-up vaccination centre in Hereford. There are two of us here who are ex-military – the other guy is an ex-submariner so we’ve got a broad range of skills. There’s not a lot that comes across our path that bamboozles us.
The first time I volunteered was on a day off from work. We were tasked with letting people know about the vaccination centre, but of course we didn’t want to browbeat them so we let people come to us.
Initially people thought we were giving out lateral flow tests – we’d say, “No, we’re here for boosters or your first or second vaccination.” It was quiet for the first hour, but word obviously spread around Hereford and by the end of the day I’d say we’d vaccinated about 120 people, from schoolkids upwards.
I think 99.99 per cent of people were happy to have a vaccination. I thought: “Even if you get five people vaccinated, that’s five people who won’t suffer.” Yes, you might catch it, but you’re much less likely to end up in hospital. When people ask me if I think it works, I feel like I can provide the back story for them. We’ve now even had people come in for their first jabs. I asked one, “What changed your mind?” He said, “Omicron, because it’s more infectious’. I just said, “Well done.” So while I don’t strong-arm people, I do tell them, “I think you should get vaccinated.”