Is COVID Back?

It's now about a year since the UK government decided to follow the likes of Denmark in winding down all the Covid provisions in the country. They were to stop providing free test kits. They started shutting down the official test centres, as well as pop-up vaccination centres - even though many clinics were to carry on providing vaccination services. All the fancy "test before you travel" rip-off centres in my neighbourhood also went back to their old businesses - tanning shops, cosmetic surgery clinics, barber shops, e.t.c.

It was a good time generally. Some of our freedoms were slowly returned, especially around travelling. Mind you we still had to adhere to International protocols since some countries like The Netherlands still had relatively strict rules. Post Brexit, the EU countries also treated the UK as a "Red Zone" at times since we were "outside" the EU.

You can imagine my surprise, then, when I got a message on my phone from my borough encouraging me to "go get vaccinated". It said something like "Dear blah blah, please go get your COVID vaccine.. blah blah". I almost chocked on my coffee haha.

This is the thing. No matter what your opinion was about the various Covid vaccines, one thing is sure. The one they have now is somewhere between totally ineffective, and harmful. Why? Well, the vaccine is based on the original variant which, by now, is completely gone. It was replaced totally nearly two years ago by Delta and eventually Omicron. Omicron was so successful that it ended up vaccinating more people than the synthetic vaccines did. Natural immunity, that is. Today, 90% or more of the UK population have had Covid - vaccinated or otherwise. Whatever variant we have left is now milder than the common cold as a result. If that vaccine ever had any benefit (and I think it did for people over the age of 80 and the immunosuppressed), the benefit is now massively overweighted by the dangers.

Having said that, I noticed the masks are back again in the shops around my place. A lot of the employees have been wearing them indoors in the past couple of weeks. Personally, I'd completely forgotten about Covid and moved on with my life, like many of us, but recently it's all come back into my consciousness due to now many people I'm seeing with masks.

It was just pretty strange to me to get a message to remind me of a time I'd rather forget. I wonder if it was just an automated scheduled message they forget to remove. Who knows. What I do know is that the UK government is getting ready for something big.

Peace & Love,

Adé