CONSERVATIVES are worried. Scotland is suffering from premature vaccination.
Take 72-year-old Harold from Perth, said Ruth Davidson. He couldn’t get the updated flu jab from his GP.
You know why? Because dopey ministers went off and ordered the wrong vaccine last year before virus boffins had told them the right one to buy.
The result, the Tory leader told First Minister’s Questions, is the Scottish NHS now trying to play catch up but finding the sole manufacturer can’t supply jabs for all Scots over 65.
“Something in the system has not worked this year,” she said. “The SNP Government began procuring vaccines for this winter in early autumn 2017, in the full knowledge that the vaccine advisory body would meet later.
“The body advised the new enhanced aTIV vaccine is the one that should be used.”
But by then, NHS Scotland had already placed its order for a different jab. D’oh!
And while Scots over 75 will still get the top notch stuff, more than half a million of my voters - sorry, people aged 65 to 74 - will get the non-vintage muck, Ms Davidson wailed.
“The reason that it matters is that there has been a dramatic rise in flu deaths in this country, from 71 two years ago to more than 300 last year.”
Whoa, said Nicola Sturgeon. Folk will be protected by whatever vaccine is tipped into them. “There is a need for all of us to be responsible in the public messaging on this issue,” she told Ms Davidson sternly. “It is in nobody’s interest to scaremonger among the population.”
Then, as we must, we moved on to Brexit.
SNP backbencher Rona Mackay asked the FM’s view on the UK government appointing the first minister for food supplies since WWII for fear of a chaotic No Deal.
Did she agree, “when we are contemplating food rationing”, that it is time to stop Brexit?
Ms Sturgeon was elated. Food rationing? That was a political dripping roast.
“It is shameful,” she said.
“If there ever comes a day when there is food rationing because of a Tory Brexit, the first people who should bear the burden are Boris Johnson, Jacob Rees-Mogg, David Davis and Michael Gove.
“We’ll see how they enjoy their Brexit bonanza.”
The SNP benches hooted and hollered at this objective assessment of the future.
Thank goodness the FM isn’t into scaremongering.
Tom Arthur drew the short straw and landed the ‘creep of the week’ slot, in which a Nat MSP is forced to debase themself by regurgitating servile rubbish from a party script.
“Our police officers represent the best of Scotland, working tirelessly all year round to keep us safe,” he read with sad eyes once full of hope. “Does the FM welcome yesterday’s announcement of the best pay deal for officers in the past 20 years?”
She did, although it was hard to make out what else she thought, as even her own bored backbenchers talking the rest of her answer.
The government really should end this awful ritual. It’s cruel and unusual punishment.
I’m not worried about MSPs, you understand, they signed up for it. But the public must be protected. The police can’t do everything.
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