Vaccine Guinea Pig

Quote: Mild Rover "I would have suggested when we had a plan that could survive the scrutiny of even its own proponents and creators for more than a few weeks. And when adequate preparations were in place. I do have some sympathy people who really wanted to leave the EU because of legitimate anxieties about ever closer political ties to Europe, because all of the prominent figures offering it were/are cartoon-ish gormers.

There would have never been a time to leave the EU that didn't cause significant disruption to what had been going on for 40 years. Unless you stayed in the single market the rules were always going to change - could we have been more prepared when was the last time a major trading nation left the EU and provided a blueprint to follow?

As somebody with legitimate anxieties about late stage capitalism, inequality and ecological collapse, I feel their pain, having had to pin my hopes on Corbyn. I mean, he meant well from my political POV, but you have to give yourself a chance.
Agreed

The problem, imo, was that with a clear and specific plan Leave probably doesn’t win the referendum. But without one, and with Johnson, Gove, JRM et al in charge of cobbling something together it was always going to be a mess.

See above - you also had the EU who let's be honest weren't keen on making it easy - understanably

That tells me almost nothing about the EU as a whole. There’s some information about its constituent parts that are in some cases making a bit of a mess of their vaccination programs. AZ is a British-Swedish multinational, with a Swedish chairman and a French-Australian CEO. I did quite a bit of work with them 2015 to 2017 and it did feel a bit more British than Roche and Novartis feel Swiss, for example. But the idea that the EU doesn’t want use their vaccine because it is too British is laughable paranoia. They’re more frustrated that they can’t get enough of it.

Why would the EU suddenly decide that the vaccine wouldn't work in over 65s with no data, then it was going to cause blood clots - again with no data to support the assumption - both theories not discounted as EU fluff. Why the AZ vaccine and not the Pfizer?

I’m not sure that leaving the EU really solves that broad problem. The freedom given by independence is often notional. In theory we’re a sovereign equal with the US but there is a massive power imbalance. It is going to be similar with the EU in some respects. With more resentment being stoked, admittedly.

I would suggest we are sovereign like the countries in SE Asia - Singapore, Vietnam, South Korea that is more of a reasonable comparison

Some of that I agree with. The simplicity of the NHS concept offers impressive value for the relatively small price we pay compared with most other wealthy countries, imo. Is commercial banking the part of banking associated with synthetic collaterized debt obligations, bankruptcies and massive public bailouts, creating a sense of injustice that led to stuff like Brexit and the Trump Presidency? Tbf, it is about 14 years since the entire system teetered on the brink of collapse, which is nice.
Commercial banking/professional services is not main stream banking its business support functionality something we are pretty good at. These guys were on the other side making all the money when the likes of Fred Goodwin got out of their depth - they weren't struggling

What new opportunities do you see for improving the areas you highlight, resulting from Brexit?
Well done on getting this far, if you have, btw.