16 family members given vaccine

GreeBo

Northernlily wrote: »

Yeah, anyone in the vicinity of the Coombe on a day to day should have got it ahead of the kids.

Why?
What puts these people at the bottom of every list?

begbysback

IAMAMORON wrote: »

It is outrageous.

It’s outrageous that people are outraged, it’s a handful of vaccines which were going to waste and somebody innocently tried to put to some use instead of into the bin.

ec18

nice to know what the perpetually annoyed are supposed to be outraged with this week on Monday, I hate when they leave it to mid week before the curtain twitchers have something to be annoyed at

polesheep

TheChizler wrote: »

I imagine you're right. But I don't know how easy it would be to find them at 9.30 pm considering they had found all they could for the other 104 extra doses.

Easy enough considering that they can find them at times such as that to cancel appointments.

irishgrover

Deleted User wrote: »

We have the worst rollout of the vaccine in the developed world and plenty to be angry about. This seems like a case of not wanting to waste the vaccine, again, down to our abysmal rollout out rather than "it's not what you know, it's who you know..." (which we'll no need see plenty of in the coming months).

In the interest of respecting opinion but also respecting actual unambiguous fact....

Your statement is 100% verifiably totally incorrect. It is false. You have either been misled OR you are lying and attempting to mislead others.
Whilst I fully respect that people have opinions and people are justifiably angry, I'm sick to the teeth of people thinking it's acceptable to make **** up. It's not.

polesheep

Christy42 wrote: »

I am sure they had all those personal numbers to hand and plenty of free time to keep ringing till they round enough who weren't working/sleeping/ out shopping. Sure hospital workers have loads of free time these days.

And I was responding to your incredulity that hospital workers might have family members nearby.

They only had to ring the wards/units within the other hospitals.

kingstevii

Christy42 wrote: »

And how many paramedics would have been on duty while that lot got their vaccinations? And you are certain none of them had anything more urgent to do. How long should the hospital ring around for the sake of it before making a call and bringing in people they already happen to know are free. Remembering that the hospital staff aren't exactly sitting around all day anyway.

If you want an "on call" list of people ready to go you can avoid this with plenty of admin. However it seems more likely that this "outrage" will lead to the vaccine getting binned.

Theres 151 paramedics every night in Dublin for brigade, so enough cover id say.. One phone call to the fire brigade mobilisation officer would've been enough..

polesheep

begbysback wrote: »

It’s outrageous that people are outraged, it’s a handful of vaccines which were going to waste and somebody innocently tried to put to some use instead of into the bin.

It's multiplied all across the country.

Amirani

GreeBo wrote: »

Why?
What puts these people at the bottom of every list?

There's no trial data to suggest that it's safe to use on kids and accordingly it hasn't been authorised to use on them by the regulators.

alwald

They should have gone through the list and ensure that the 16 vaccines are offered to the priority groups. They could have easily called other hospitals to check if they need the 16 jabs.
Did family members travel beyond 5 km? If yes it's even more embarrassing.
The only way out of this is a resignation.

irishgrover

What's very clear is that it's daft that there is not (or was not) a protocol in place to deal with leftovers. How did no one this that this would happen and ID a solution in advance

Casati

GhostyMcGhost wrote: »

And the vaccines were otherwise gone to waste. For once someone was trying to be proactive and use every single dose available in some way and avoid waste

The headline could make for great click bait but in the circumstances I have to agree, give the vaccine to someone if there’s a few left over. Of course you now need to find 16 second doses for those people

The bigger scandal would be throwing perfectly good vaccines in the bin. At the time there was no way to contact anyone on a waiting list and the HSE basically were clueless what to do

Why would they have gone to waste? Surely the hospital could have made a call to other hospitals or the many medical centres that operate within 2km of the hospital. If they have any reasonable level of planning it would be very easy to find a front line medical workers who hasn't been vaccinated

dclifford

I think the headline of 16 jabs wasted would be worse than the one this morning.
It is not ideal how it occurred, and I expect there are teething problems for this and hope they sort them soon.

quokula

Russman wrote: »

From the article I read about it, it seems they had 120 extra doses at the end of the day due to getting 6 and sometimes 7 doses from the vials. They seemingly contacted everyone they could and even after that, were still left with 16 doses, and then the family members were called in. TBH if that's the case I've no issue with it at all.
If, however, staff members were being left short because family members were getting it, its another matter altogether, but it doesn't seem to be the case here.

The optics are terrible and it just gives the baying mob reason to be outraged, but, meh, storm in a teacup for me.

Sadly facts and reason are often thrown out the window for outrage merchants who love any reason to have a go at people who are doing a lot more for society than they are.

There's a few things to note here.

One, the amount of doses in a batch isn't definitive. The suppliers include an excess amount in each batch, to allow for loss during transfer to syringes. So sometimes, you end up with more doses than expected.

Two, once made up, they have a very limited shelf life before they must be binned.

Three, pregnant or breastfeeding women can't be given the vaccine so that rules out their patients.

Four, as easy as it is to say, they likely don't know who has or hasn't been vaccinated in nearby hospitals and it's probably not sensible to take up time and pull people who are in the middle of shifts caring for patients away from their wards so they can travel up the road to get one of the spares, when those who aren't already vaccinated are likely already in the queue to get it within days anyway.

Five, as you mentioned there were a bunch more excess doses, and they only resorted to family members for the last few. They could have grabbed randomers off the street and hoped they had ID on them, but it was probably easier and more reliable to track when it was people they knew.

Six, it was only 16 doses. On a national scale that is nothing. But the outcome of this is that excess doses will be binned all over the country in the near future and we'll all be worse off.

I've a friend working in University College Hospital London and they have excess left over at the end of each day and they were doing similar at first, as they've been doing it longer they now have a system that you can put yourself on a waiting list, regardless of age or priority, as long as you live close enough and can turn up at short notice if they call you when they have leftovers. Hopefully we'll get something similar in place before long but this kind of outrage will set us back.

polesheep

ec18 wrote: »

nice to know what the perpetually annoyed are supposed to be outraged with this week on Monday, I hate when they leave it to mid week before the curtain twitchers have something to be annoyed at

I am neither perpetually annoyed nor a curtain twitcher. It didn't take long for FF to be back in power before the nepotism and cronyism came to the fore again.

Jim_Hodge

Deleted User wrote: »

We have the worst rollout of the vaccine in the developed world and plenty to be angry about. This seems like a case of not wanting to waste the vaccine, again, down to our abysmal rollout out rather than "it's not what you know, it's who you know..." (which we'll no need see plenty of in the coming months).

Talk about 'fake news'! There's so much wrong with that statement that it really doesn't warrant comment but such patently inaccurate garbage has to be called out for what it is.

SteM

polesheep wrote: »

It's multiplied all across the country.

This happened last Friday night and it's all over every media outlet. Do you think if it the same thing was across the country it wouldn't have come out already?

Christy42

polesheep wrote: »

They only had to ring the wards/units within the other hospitals.

You mean to get the ones that are currently working...?

They do have actual jobs you know. They aren't just sitting around in hospitals for the good of their health. And most of them are also likely vaccinated. Or are we then trying some mad scramble drill were the admin staff of a load of wards are ringing staff at home for an hour for the sake of 16 vaccines?

meeeeh

polesheep wrote: »

I am neither perpetually annoyed nor a curtain twitcher. It didn't take long for FF to be back in power before the nepotism and cronyism came to the fore again.

Shinner then... Predictable.

seamus

polesheep wrote: »

They only had to ring the wards/units within the other hospitals.

And what, though? Transfer a patient from an acute hospital to a maternity hospital just so you can jab them, and then send them back again? Have staff members from another hospital come in, risking contamination of the maternity hospital?

There's lots of great ideas in hindsight, but when you're on the clock you can't make rash decisions.

Amirani wrote: »

There's no trial data to suggest that it's safe to use on kids and accordingly it hasn't been authorised to use on them by the regulators.

They weren't given to kids. They were the adult children of the Master of the Coombe, who also work in the hospital on a part time bases. The Irish Times has framed this whole thing to sound like he called his wife and she drove the X-7 down with some five year olds in the back seat to get the vaccines.

Amirani

irishgrover wrote: »

What's very clear is that it's daft that there is not (or was not) a protocol in place to deal with leftovers. How did no one this that this would happen and ID a solution in advance

I think in general too much autonomy has been given to hospital groups in how they use their vaccine allocations.

Some hospital groups will have come up with these protocols, but many won't. Also problematic is how some hospital groups have chosen to ignore hospitals within their group (e.g. Nenagh within the UL group). These protocols should have been prescribed nationally by the HSE.

hynesie08

Casati wrote: »

Why would they have gone to waste? Surely the hospital could have made a call to other hospitals or the many medical centres that operate within 2km of the hospital. If they have any reasonable level of planning it would be very easy to find a front line medical workers who hasn't been vaccinated

So, how do you sort that list? "hello James's, I know you've 500 staff, but I've got 16 vaccines here so pick your favourite, and have them here within the hour"

c.p.w.g.w

Will agree thatvthw should not have been binned...but surely they could have been used in nearby hospital, which are 15-30 Minutes drive, or even to other frontline staff nearby

Amirani

seamus wrote: »

They weren't given to kids. They were the adult children of the Master of the Coombe, who also work in the hospital on a part time bases. The Irish Times has framed this whole thing to sound like he called his wife and she drove the X-7 down with some five year olds in the back seat to get the vaccines.

I'm aware of that.

I assumed the OP was asking why "kids" (in general) were at the bottom of every priority list? See post 92.

Nozebleed

Nozebleed wrote: »

RESIGN. blatant corruption.

Cancel culture all over again. God you'd be weary of the outrage! Covid has really brought out the worst in so many people.

This is Golfgate all over again, and "drinking on the streets" gate, and "all those idiots who met family over Christmas" gate, and "kids are super spreaders" gate and "house party idiots" gate.

(1) There was an apology, (2) it shouldn't have happened, (3) it was better than throwing them in a bin, (4) it wont happen again. 16 spare vaccines were used, not 1600 or 16,000! Get some perspective and move on.

We all need to focus on the positives, getting more efficient with the vaccine rollout, Spring is coming, numbers are falling rapidly etc. Don't spend an entire WEEK of your lives being outraged over this until someone else is forced to resign, and the permanently outraged are appeased. Then something else annoys someone, they tweet it along with a video, and the witch hunt begins again. Its beyond wearisome at this stage.

lawred2

GhostyMcGhost wrote: »

And the vaccines were otherwise gone to waste. For once someone was trying to be proactive and use every single dose available in some way and avoid waste

The headline could make for great click bait but in the circumstances I have to agree, give the vaccine to someone if there’s a few left over. Of course you now need to find 16 second doses for those people

The bigger scandal would be throwing perfectly good vaccines in the bin. At the time there was no way to contact anyone on a waiting list and the HSE basically were clueless what to do

I don't know does this wash... any bit of advance planning should match X recipients with X doses.

froog

What a difference between the headlines and the actual story. I have little problem with using vaccines rather than throwing in the bin. Clearly 16 people didnt show up for their appointments. Should they have had a backup list of people to call first? Probably although not sure hiw that would work. maybe they did and already went through that list.

polesheep

SteM wrote: »

This happened last Friday night and it's all over every media outlet. Do you think if it the same thing was across the country it wouldn't have come out already?

Staff in the hospitals have raised issues for the past few weeks. TDs have raised issues. It would seem that journalists are the last to the table as usual. But then what passes as journalism in this country these days is little more than state PR.

An Ri rua

begbysback wrote: »

It’s outrageous that people are outraged, it’s a handful of vaccines which were going to waste and somebody innocently tried to put to some use instead of into the bin.

Stop being idiotic. Nobody is, or should be, binning vaccines. God help us if they can't plan for that and have the right people in line. If they'd finished vaccinating at 330am, then they might not have even got their magic 16. So plan starting, plan finishing....

Plan?? It's not rocket science.

Line those 16 up in a yard and then line up 16 cystic fibrosis sufferers and then talk that sh1te you're talking.

It's wrong, plain and simple. Never mind your 'only 16 vaccines'. Would you like your lotteries run like that? Your votes?

QED.

Grumpypants

Casati wrote: »

Why would they have gone to waste? Surely the hospital could have made a call to other hospitals or the many medical centres that operate within 2km of the hospital. If they have any reasonable level of planning it would be very easy to find a front line medical workers who hasn't been vaccinated

Did you read the article? They did call the HSE to try and find others that needed them and after they got nowhere with that, and after all the frontline workers had received the jab, they gave then to people rather than chuck them in the bin.

The headline should be Quick thinking from Hospital staff speeds up vaccination program.

Now you will see the same scenario in other hospitals but the jabs will be binned due to red tape.



Here is the quote

"The team at the hospital proactively contacted the HSE to inform them of the additional available doses and actively sought out frontline workers to vaccinate.

"The hospital followed Government guidelines and focussed on the two current priority groups".

At the end of the day when 16 vaccine doses were left "and to ensure that vaccines were not wasted they were administered to family members of employees of the hospital".


"Of the 16 recipients, nine were over 70 and the remaining seven were of varying age. It would not be appropriate for the hospital to comment on the individuals involved".