Dr. Steve James, a consultant anesthetist at King’s College Hospital in south London, challenged and told the UK’s health secretary that he won’t get the COVID vaccine and that his ‘natural immunity’ after contracting COVID is equivalent or superior to someone who is vaccinated.
Health Secretary Sajid Javid was confronted by the unvaccinated doctor regarding the government’s policy of mandatory COVID vaccination for NHS staff during his visit to the hospital.
Last December, MPs created law to force Covid-19 vaccination mandatory for all patient-facing health and social care workers in England including nurses.
During Javid’s visit, he asked the staff members on the intensive care unit about their views on the mandatory vaccination for NHS staff. The nurses didn’t answer but Dr. James interrupted and said he is not happy with the mandatory requirement.
“I had COVID at some point. Yes, I’ve got antibodies. I’ve been working on COVID ICU since the beginning. I have not had a vaccination. I do not want to have a vaccination. The vaccine is reducing transmission only for eight weeks with Delta, with Omicron, it’s probably less. And for that, I would be dismissed if I don’t have a vaccine. The science isn’t strong enough,” said the brave doctor.
Dr. James added that there’s another colleague who’s also in the same position.
Then the health secretary responded, “I understand that. And obviously, we had to weigh all that up for both health and social care, and there will always be a debate about it.”
Dr. James suggested maybe there’s an opportunity to reconsider the rules and allow doctors who’ve had antibodies and who haven’t had the vaccination to not take the COVID vaccine.
“Because the protection I’ve got from the transmission is probably equivalent to someone who’s vaccinated,” he added.
But the health secretary assumed that his natural immunity will wane as well.
Then the doctor gave him a free refresher course about the vaccine.
“But if you want to provide protection with the booster, you’d have to inject everybody every month. If it’s worn off by two months, if the protection is worn off, the transmission after two months, then after a month, you’ve still got a bit of protection. So you want to maintain protection, you’re going to need to boost all staff members every single month, which you’re not going to do,” James said.
The King’s College Hospital released a statement about their new rules:
“While currently it is not a mandatory requirement for staff to get their COVID-19 vaccination or disclose vaccination status to patients, we strongly support and encourage all our staff to get their jab, in line with national guidance – and nearly 90% of our staff have already done so.”
