As part of their "Oldies Online Too" project South Reading Patient Voice has conducted a survey of older peoples experience and opinions of digital access to GP surgeries. The results will be presented and discussed at an online workshop from 10am - 11.30am, Wednesday 17th March . Wrokshop participants will receive the full report. There will be an introduction by Cllr Graeme Hoskin, chair of Reading's Health and Wellbeing Board. Sign up for the workshop at healthsurvey.uk/workshop

Reading's Health and Wellbeing Board meets on Friday 19th March at 2pm via Teams. To receive a link or to pose a question please send email to Nicky.Simpson@reading.gov.uk

House of Lords, London SW1A 0PW tylerp@parliament.uk home 01452 812099 22 February 2021 As we receive our Covid-19 vaccination free from the NHS many of us may be reminded both of our good fortune and of the challenge faced by lower income countries. Since it is so obviously in everyones interest that the pandemic is tackled on a global basis there is now a practical way to say thank you. This week GAVI (the Global Alliance on Vaccination and Immunisation) has made it possible for us to make individual donations to support COVAX, the UN/WHO sponsored initiative to provide access to safe and effective Covid-19 vaccine in 92 poorer countries. We hope as many UK vaccine recipients as possible will follow our lead to donate what they can to this programme through the website www.gavi.org/donate by selecting the specific link for COVAX One World Protected. In this way we can all celebrate our first or second vaccination with a very practical contribution to the efforts to defeat the pandemic: Get One = Give One. Signatories: Helene Hayman (Baroness Hayman, former Lord Speaker, Crossbencher) Doreen Lawrence (Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon, Labour) Alan Smith (Lord Bishop of St Albans) Paul Tyler (Lord Tyler, Liberal Democrat) George Young (Lord Young of Cookham, Conservative)

The Reading Covid-19 Outbreak Engagement Board meets on line at 2pm on Friday 26th February 2021. Please contact Nicky.Simpson@reading.gov.uk to take part.

The Reading Covid-19 Outbreak Engagement Board meets on line at 2pm on Friday 26th February 2021. Please contact Nicky.Simpson@reading.gov.uk to take part.

South Reading Patient Voice will meet online at 6pm on Wed, 17th February 2021. You can join via this link There will be time for a short discussion on the NHS reforms as well as local news.

Reading's Health and Wellbeing Board meets online at 2pm on Friday 22nd January 2021. Please apply to nicky.simpson@reading.gov.uk if you want to observe the meeting or have a question.

Here are latest patient newsletters from Berkshire West ICP:

1. July 2021
2. June 2021
3. May 2021
4. March 2021
5. February 2021
6. January 2021
7. January 2021 Covid Vaccination Update
8. December 2020 newsletter 

The US Food and Drug Administration has released information on the BoiNtech/Pfizer coronavirus vaccine ahead of its meeting to consider emergency certification in the USA. It is noteworthy that the definition of a "case" is quite different from that used for the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine so that the claimed efficacies are not comparable. For the BioNtech/Pfizer vaccine a swab is taken when an acute respiratory illness develops. For the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine weekly swabs are taken. These are clearly different and will result in spurious lower apparent efficacy for the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine.

A peer-reviewed account of the interim results of the Oxford AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine (ChAdOx1) trials has appeared as an article in The Lancet . 23,848 people took part. Analysis of efficacy was based on weekly self-administered postal PCR swab tests in the UK arm of the trial. Altogether 30 participants who had received the vaccine and 101 who received the control had detectable Covid-19. 10 participants were hospitalised, none of them having received the vaccine, and of them one died.