Chile is about to resume vaccinating people by age without any special reason to be vaccinated.
So on Wednesday they start at 59 years and then do a year a day.
It has also vaccinated all teachers, all those with pre-existing conditions and by Tuesday will have finished all those in Basic Services (everything from bus drivers to trash collection).
Interestingly, but I suppose logically, my perfectly fit and healthy 19year old daughter will be vaccinated next week since we have elections coming up and she is one of those chosen to assist. (Here assisting an election is done a bit like jury service selection in the UK. It's not optional).
There's a couple of things screwing up the Chileans though;
The most badly affected age group are the 25 - 45s and they are a) thick and b) believe that Coronavirus doesn't apply to them.
Reading between the lines I think Sinovac (the Chinese vaccine) doesn't give protection very quickly and even then really needs the second dose though it does eventually reach a good level of protection. Infection rates are not falling (unsurprising) and hospitalisation rates are not falling (that is surprising).
I have no evidence, that's just my judgement. Consequently despite the impressive numbers I think vaccine protection is lagging the infection rate by about 3 weeks. T Which means we've got at least another 2 weeks of escalating s*** here.
The civil unrest is still here. It keeps erupting but is either suppressed by our military curfew (10pm) or tear gassed and water cannon'd. It is smaller than before, and doesn't seem to be reaching international news. But it is there, growing and a source of infections.
Life in the Third World is considerably bug'ring up my attempts to watch the 6 Nations in the pub with my friends. FYI, we were in the pub the other night and our group of 7 have all been vaccinated and are all strict followers of the precautions.
On which point, it is interesting that the strictest followers of the precautions are the hospitality trades and the worst are the average office workers and shoppers. (My perception).
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