people should not kiss their grandchildren even if they have received a second dose of coronavirus vaccine, an expert claimed today.
Professor Anthony Harnden, vice-chair of the Joint Committee on Vaccines and Immunization (JCVI), said it may not be safe to break social distance rules even after taking two doses.
Professor Harnden said on BBC Radio 4’s Today program by a listener whether he was allowed to kiss his grandchildren at school-going age, with the JCVI vice-president answering “no”.
“You have to be really careful and remember that even after the second dose of vaccine, it is not necessarily 100 percent effective,” he said.
“At the moment we still have to be careful and follow the rules and I do not think to kiss grandchildren”.
Professor Harnden added that although the vaccine provides protection against serious diseases, the protection it generally provides is still unknown.
“Well, it offers you very good protection against serious diseases and hospitalization, but we do not yet know how much protection it offers against asymptomatic infections,” he said.
Research conducted by Public Health Scotland found four weeks after the first dose that hospital admissions were reduced by 94 per cent for the AstraZeneca jab.
The Pfizer / BioNTech and Moderna vaccines have been found to be effective at 95 percent and 94.5 percent, respectively.
Government advisers have said the UK’s vaccination program should be continued at age, and those in their forties are expected to recover within a few weeks.
Professor Harnden’s comment comes when Susan Michie, a scientist from Sage, warned that people may follow the restrictions on closure less strictly after being vaccinated for coronavirus.
She told BBC Radio 4’s Today program: ‘The concern is that as the vaccination program comes into effect and more people are vaccinated themselves and see other people in their community vaccinated, people may drop their hats.’
She said evidence came from Lyme disease and the deployment of flu vaccines, where fewer were vaccinated to follow preventative behaviors.
In national surveys of December, about 29% of people said that after being vaccinated, they would adhere less strictly to the rules and 11% said that they would not follow the rules.