Update from the European Medicines Agency is quite a significant mixed bag. Officially recommends blood clots be listed as 'very rare side effect' - but doubles down on safety of vaccine overall: ema.europa.eu/en/news/astraz…
'EMA is reminding healthcare professionals and people receiving the vaccine to remain aware of the possibility of very rare cases of blood clots combined with low levels of blood platelets occurring within 2 weeks of vaccination.'
Mar 29, 2021 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
This point was emphasised multiple times in today's press conference. It's an extremely bad road for the government to go down. They're saying it to ensure people keep following the rules; but the way they're starting to talk abt jabs undermines the miracle we're pulling off! 1/
Nobody thought we'd get vaccines that are 100% effective. That we have multiple jabs estimated to have over 90% efficacy (and evidence so far suggesting nearly 100% effective at preventing hospitalisation and death) is truly miraculous. 2/
Nov 30, 2020 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
The government's promised analysis of the economic effects of the tier system is, in fact, an explanation as to why they are still not estimating the impact of specific restrictions. V difficult to see how this appeases the economic rebels: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/upl…
'Any attempt to estimate specific economic impacts of precise changes to individual restrictions for a defined period of time would be subject to such wide uncertainty as to not be meaningful for precise policy making'
...surely the same is true of Covid modeling, which we do...
Mar 17, 2020 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Chancellor announces an incredible £330bn pounds of guarantees - so businesses can take out loans to support themselves and employees. Says he will go further if required.
Business rates holiday announcement from last week extended - Chancellor announces all businesses in retail, hospitality and leisure sectors are exempt from business rates for 12 months.
Nov 27, 2019 • 6 tweets • 5 min read
Today when debating @DrTonyOSullivan on @SkyNews, he said 3 things about the NHS that were explicitly not true, re NHS spending, historical outcomes on the NHS, and privatisation within the NHS. Evidence to counter his claims below:
@DrTonyOSullivan@SkyNews 1) Dr O'Sullivan claimed all countries I listed, which get better patient outcomes, spend lots more on healthcare than UK. When I pushed him on Australia, which is one of the best to compare re population, etc, he doubled down. But this isn't the case. data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.X…
Oct 18, 2019 • 10 tweets • 4 min read
The substantial changes to the #BrexitDeal Johnson has secured make it significantly better than the deal before.
In fact, I’d say it’s a good deal outright, regardless of previous versions. It unlocks the opportunities that Brexit creates. 1/10
The backstop is gone. The UK is out of the Customs Union. This means all parts of the UK, including NI, can strike free trade deals around the world. Virtually all economists agree free trade boosts prosperity. Win/win for everyone. 2/10
Jun 8, 2019 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
So far I've found 14 egregious errors in @carolecadwalla's thread about @iealondon and me. Sadly she doesn’t seem interested in correcting them. Strange, when your ‘thing’ is tackling disinformation. She's right about one thing though. @iealondon had a fantastic week. 1/4
.@iealondon is a relatively small charity (in terms of staff & turnover), but my colleagues are great. They punch above their weight. People like Carole may not like our message of liberty (and will say & do anything to avoid debating the actual issues) but so many people do. 2/4
Jun 5, 2019 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
The claim that the #NHS could be 'sold off' in a US/UK trade deal is ridiculous - a political storm in a tea cup.
But the storm has moved into #PMQs today. So here we go - 3 reasons why this is about political posturing and nothing else (thread).
1) Shock, horror: American companies can already bid, and win, NHS contracts. American companies own NHS hospitals (@GuidoFawkes thread below). People may not like this, but let’s stop treating it like breaking news.
US and UK are interesting reflections of each other right now. Government malfunctioning, gridlock, growing public resentment. But Bercow's actions today have set in motion importing something awful from the States: that is, breaking with rules and procedure for short-term gain.
The US has been dealing with the ramifications of the extension of executive power for years. The George W Bush era massively expanded executive power to justify war-time activity - including torture and mass surveillance, sans warrants.
Most people realize ‘think tank engages in fundraising’ is not a credible story. Nonetheless, here’s a (long) #thread on their attempt to avoid engaging in the battle of ideas.
My colleagues and I have been facing an increasing number of accusations (mostly from social media), that we’re paid to say what we say. That our commitments to free-markets and liberty are simply bought-and-sold sound bites. This could not be further from the truth.
Jul 15, 2018 • 5 tweets • 3 min read
If May's goal on #Marr was to sell the #WhitePaper as 'Mansion House tweaked', it was not a successful outing to the BBC. The divergence from original Brexit promises has now been exposed completely.
First, a few points of clarity. May's claim that UK has to stick to "EU rulebook" to trade is simply not the case. "Mutual recognition" could allow for trade in goods to continue & give UK real autonomy (look out for new IEA research tomorrow: telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/…) #Marr
Summary: The government’s new pay gap reporting measures fail to provide any meaningful insight into equal or fair pay for men and women in the workplace.
Not only are the measurements useless; they are also problematic. Incentives created include hiring fewer women into junior or lower paid roles – regardless of their qualifications – to achieve the closest calculation a company can get to a 0% #paygap. iea.org.uk/publications/t…
