It's A National Tragedy: When Covid-19 Puts Our Ethnic Minorities More At Risk, Why IS The Uptake Of The Jab Among BAME Patients So Much Lower, Asks SUE REID
It's a national tragedy: When Covid-19 puts our ethnic minorities more at risk, why IS the uptake of the jab among BAME patients so much lower, asks SUE REIDThere’s no shortage of customers for Covid-19 vaccinations at Blackburn Cathedral, where, for generations, local folk have sung Christian hymns in their Sunday best.
Today, the imposing building is open for other business. Instead of saving souls, it is busy helping to save lives.
Volunteers hold umbrellas over Lancashire’s elderly, many in wheelchairs or propped up by walking sticks, as they guide them into the crypt for pre-booked appointments to have the Covid-19 vaccine.
First in the door as the cathedral opened as a jabs’ hub was John Mason, 82, from Bolton. When he emerged 20 minutes later, he said: ‘It was easy-peasy. Nothing to worry about.’
But that’s not how everyone round here sees it.
The vaccinations were first offered to all Lancastrians aged 80 and above living within a 45-minute drive of the cathedral, an area dotted by multicultural former mill towns.
Yet we found a dramatic mismatch between people turning up and the ethnic make-up of those who live in this part of the North-West.
A major survey by the UK Household Longitudinal Study has found 42 per cent of Asian or Asian British individuals were ‘unlikely’ or ‘very unlikely’ to take the coronavirus vaccine. Pictured: Mufti Zubair Butt, a Muslim imam and chaplain, is vaccinated with the Pfizer jab against Covid-19 at Whetley Medical Centre, Bradford
Over eight hours at the cathedral on the second day of the jabs’ rollout, only five of the 250 people vaccinated were of South Asian heritage, and all were elderly ladies brought by a younger family member. It was a similar sight of predominately white faces the next day.
All this raises a sensitive question. Why do so few from the local Pakistani and Indian communities want the vaccine when it could save their lives?
A major survey by the UK Household Longitudinal Study has found 42 per cent of Asian or Asian British individuals were ‘unlikely’ or ‘very unlikely’ to have it.
Even more shocking was the fact that 72 per cent of black people (of Caribbean or African heritage) are wary of inoculation.
Last week, NHS England announced it is to give £23 million to local councils to encourage uptake of the jab among high-risk groups, including the BAME (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic) community.
Justin Varney, Birmingham’s public health director, warned that 50 per cent of residents in parts of his city with the largest BAME population are reluctant to have the jab.
Medical workers in Stoke-on-Trent have reported a non-attendance rate of up to 30 per cent among BAME patients invited for vaccination, compared with just 2 to 3 per cent of others in the city.
The extraordinary level of reluctance among non-white British people not only jeopardises the vaccination programme, but also the lives of those most at risk from the virus.
Though they make up 11 per cent of the population, it has hit their communities hardest of all.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics show that black men are 4.7 times — and black women 4.3 times — more likely to suffer a Covid-related death than white people of the same age.
Even after adjustments for deprivation, occupational exposure to the disease and other factors, it is a similarly tragic story.
Vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi, who was born in Iraq and who revealed yesterday that he had lost his 88-year-old uncle, Faiz Issa, to Covid-19 a fortnight ago, has warned that if BAME people shy away from inoculation, the virus will ‘quickly infect’ their communities and spread to others.
Yet still countless numbers refuse to have it. Last month, in an unprecedented High Court ruling, a West Indian-born woman who lives in a care home, was ordered to have the jab — to the ‘dismay’ of her family.
Her son desperately argued in court that his mother — a retired London secretary who is in her 80s and has dementia — should not get the jab because the testing was carried out predominantly on ‘white people’.
He insisted that doctors, who had brought the case to the Court of Protection (where judges rule on the healthcare of vulnerable adults), should wait to vaccinate his mother until there is more proof of its safety for people like her.
A video of celebrities of Asian heritage, including TV presenter Konnie Huq (pictured), actress Meera Syal and cricketer Moeen Ali — who recovered from Covid — has been released to take aim at the fake news spreading on social media
Mistrust of the vaccine has spread among black British NHS nurses and even some doctors. Some of them are refusing to have the jab because they want to ‘watch and wait’ to see if it is safe.
Others have friends or relatives who have caught Covid since being inoculated (which is, sadly, possible because the jab may take weeks to provoke immunity), and so believe it is ineffective.
The Mail has been told that at one North London hospital, refusal among BAME nurses is so prevalent, vaccines prepared for the day are having to be thrown away when these frontline staff fail to turn up for their appointments.
And yet black and Asian NHS staff have accounted for 63 per cent of Covid deaths, despite making up only 21 per cent of the workforce.
One senior nurse at a London NHS practice told us: ‘Vaccine fear is a huge problem among my black British staff. More than half of my small group of nurses won’t have it, even though they are on the front line of the vaccine roll-out and should be role models to encourage uptake in their communities.
Star support: Celebrities including Konnie Huq and Meera Syal (pictured) encourage vaccination in Adil Ray’s video
‘I feel they have a civic duty to get the jab, as they come face to face with patients. I have heard of an African NHS doctor who is saying no to it, too.’
Meanwhile, some of the world’s top vaccine experts are also having difficulty persuading their nearest and dearest to have the jab.
Jamaican-born Herb Sewell, emeritus professor of immunology at Nottingham University, says: ‘Members of my own family — apparently intelligent people — have picked up this anti-vaccine stuff.’
He has had ‘a word’ with the doubters and hopes he has won them round. But he is not sure all his loved ones have listened.
Professor Sewell adds that black icons, such as the rapper Stormzy or Manchester United footballer and campaigner Marcus Rashford, should become vaccine champions to counter the propaganda, particularly among young people.
A video of celebrities of Asian heritage, including TV presenter Konnie Huq, actress Meera Syal and cricketer Moeen Ali — who recovered from Covid — has been released to take aim at the fake news spreading on social media.
The five-minute reel, focusing on the Asian community, was the idea of TV presenter Adil Ray, who says: ‘We felt we needed to do something.’
So how has the deep mistrust gained a stranglehold?
Emmanuel Adeseko, 32, a Birmingham pastor, is urging Afro-Caribbean people to be inoculated after revelations that the take-up in parts of his city is touching 50 per cent.
‘Some of the real fear is caused by the misinformation on social media — there is so much of it,’ says Mr Adeseko, whose own father, 65-year-old Nathaniel, died from Covid-19 in April. ‘But it’s not just one thing; there are religious beliefs at play and some people have had negative experiences with healthcare in the past.’
Dr Abdul Zubairu, a GP in Southport, Merseyside, who has had the jab as a frontline health worker, explained in The Voice newspaper — with a mostly Afro-Caribbean readership — that there is a history of medical maltreatment in the black community ‘we cannot ignore’.
The forced sterilisation of black women in the U.S., a lack of UK research into the blood disorder sickle-cell disease — which affects mainly black people — and shocking statistics showing that black women are five times more likely than those from other races to die in pregnancy and childbirth, have stoked a general mistrust of health authorities.
Professor Sewell also cites memories of the horrific Tuskegee experiment, a decades-long project to investigate syphilis in the U.S. State of Alabama which began in 1932.
More than 600 African-American men were experimented on into the 1970s. Some were not treated long after the discovery of penicillin, which could have cured them.
Twenty-eight died while others went blind or insane. Some wives caught the disease and passed it on to their babies. Little wonder the scandal has not been forgotten.
Dr Farzana Hussain, an NHS clinical director in Newham, East London, says: ‘I have had several consultations with African patients who are nervous about the speed of the vaccine rollout. They are also worried about claims it can permanently damage their bodies.’
Meanwhile, in Blackburn, nearly one in five households has little or no English, so the Government’s message to stay at home may not be reaching them.
In a 2016 Government report by integration tsar Louise Casey, the town was deemed to be among the UK’s most racially segregated.
It has earned notoriety since for being in the top league for Covid-19 infections.
We were so concerned about the low numbers of BAME people at the Cathedral the first time we visited, that we returned to check it was not the wet weather that had put them off from coming.
But of 100 people who receive their vaccination that next afternoon, only 13 are from the Pakistani and Indian communities.
Iftakhar Hussein, a Blackburn council worker, wheeling in his 85-year-old mother, Gil Begum, explains: ‘There are a lot of myths and conspiracy theories going around about the jabs. But we have to put our trust in them.
‘The mosques, Muslim councillors and doctors are all encouraging us to have the vaccine — people should listen.’
Another of the few South Asian women at the cathedral hub is Nirmala Passi, 86, escorted by her son, Dharum. The family is Hindu and from nearby Preston. Dharum, 62, says: ‘The jab is the best thing for us all. Some of the Muslim community believe it contains alcohol or pork products (forbidden by the Islamic faith). That’s not true, yet the misinformation has taken hold.’
The Hussein and Passi families are, sadly, a rarity.
As well as Blackburn, we visit London vaccination hubs to learn the extent of the vaccine-phobia, often fuelled by claims that the jab alters your DNA, gives governments data via a chip to track a person’s movement, or even infects them with the disease itself.
In Southall, West London, Sam Patel, 42, a finance manager, has brought his aunt. ‘My family have worn masks throughout the pandemic,’ he says. ‘Like many British Indian families, we have lots of relatives in the NHS, so we understand how necessary the vaccine is.’ Sam’s 69-year-old mother has just spent ten days in hospital after catching the virus, her family believes, during a late Christmas shopping visit to a local supermarket.
‘Covid-19 is so prevalent in our area of London,’ Sam says.
A few minutes later, an elderly couple leave the vaccine centre, the lady in an apple-green sari and wearing protective latex gloves.
She explains that she and her husband are both 85-year-old Muslims from the Bohra community — a sect of Islam that is telling its followers to have the vaccine.
‘There are many different Muslim groups,’ says the woman, who decides not to give her name. ‘Not all of them think as we do, and some are afraid of what it will put into them.’
There are other worries, too. Dr Chaand Nagpaul, leader of the British Medical Association, the doctors’ professional body, says government advice on social distancing, masks and vaccinations must be in multiple languages so everyone can understand.
Which makes the words of Blackburn fishmonger Zohar Mahaldar so disturbing.
He survived Covid-19 last year and hails from Bastwell, a suburb with ten mosques, where one in ten people tested positive for the virus last year. It’s a nine-minute drive from the cathedral vaccination hub. Before the latest lockdown, he told The Guardian he could not count how many people he’d had to ‘shoo out’ of his shop for not wearing a mask.
‘People here won’t take responsibility for their own health,’ he said. ‘They think it’s Allah’s will, that He will protect them from Covid-19. But I say to them: “Allah also gave you a brain”.’
AdvertisementFinal Goodbye: Influential People Who Died In 2020
In a year defined by a devastating pandemic, the world many important activists, great athletes and entertainers who helped define their genres.
Many of them were internationally famous, like – RBG, Kobe, Maradona, Eddie Van Halen, Little Richard, Sean Connery – but Hong Kong lost its fair share of heroes too.
Pandemic restrictions often limited the public’s ability to mourn their loss in a year that saw nearly 1.8 million people die from the coronavirus.
Here is a roll-call of some influential figures who died in 2020 (cause of death cited for younger people, if available):
2020 in review: Korean films of the year
January
Khagendra Thapa Magar, 27. The world’s shortest man (who could walk) was just 67.08cm tall. He was awarded his title in 2010 when he was 18. He lost the title to a fellow Nepali, Chandra Bahadur Dangi, who measured 54.6cm. January 17. Pneumonia.
Kobe Bryant, 41. The 18-time NBA All-Star won five championships and became one of the greatest basketball players of his generation during a 20-year career spent entirely with the Los Angeles Lakers. January 26. Helicopter crash. His 13-year-old daughter Gianna and seven others were also killed.
The world mourned when Kobe Bryant - along with his daughter Gianna and seven others - died in a helicopter crash.
February
Daniel arap Moi, 95. A former schoolteacher who became Kenya’s longest-serving president. He presided over years of repression and economic turmoil fuelled by runaway corruption. February 4.
Kirk Douglas, 103. The intense, muscular actor with the dimpled chin, who starred in Spartacus , Lust for Life and dozens of other films, reigned for decades as a Hollywood maverick and patriarch. February 5.
Joseph Shabalala, 79. The founder of the South African a cappella group Ladysmith Black Mambazo, which sang in the local vocal styles of isicathamiya and mbube. Hits include Homeless , and Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes with Paul Simon. February 11.
Lady Margaret Noel MacLehose, 99. The wife of former Hong Kong governor Murray MacLehose. She and her husband were very fond of walking and Hong Kong’s MacLehose Trail – from Sai Kung to Tuen Mun in the New Territories – was named after them. She also set up the Riding for the Disabled Charity and was chairwoman of the Community Chest. The Lady MacLehose Holiday Village has been turned into a quarantine centre during the Covid-19 outbreak. February 22.
Thich Quang Do, 91. A Buddhist monk who became the public face of religious dissent in Vietnam while the Communist government kept him in prison or under house arrest for more than 20 years. February 22.
Katherine Johnson, 101. A mathematician who calculated rocket trajectories and Earth orbits for Nasa’s early space missions. She was later portrayed in the 2016 hit film Hidden Figures, about pioneering Black female aerospace workers. February 24.
Hosni Mubarak, 91. The former Egyptian leader who was the autocratic face of stability in the Middle East for nearly 30 years before being forced from power in an Arab Spring uprising. February 25.
2020 in review: Video games
March
Jack Welch, 84. The business guru who transformed General Electric into a highly profitable multinational company. After he retired, he launched a new career as a corporate leadership guru. March 1. Kidney failure.
Javier Perez de Cuellar, 100. The two-term United Nations secretary general brokered a historic ceasefire between Iran and Iraq in 1988. Later, he came out of retirement to help re-establish democracy in his Peruvian homeland. March 4.
Chan Tai-ho, 87. Hong Kong tycoon and the founder of Playmates toymaker which gave the world the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle action figures. March 5.
Max von Sydow, 90. The actor known to art house audiences through his work with Swedish director Ingmar Bergman and later to film-goers everywhere when he played the priest in the controversial horror classic, The Exorcist . March 8.
Arnaldo de Oliveira Sales, 100. Known as the Father of Hong Kong Sport, he played a part in the creation of many Hong Kong sporting facilities, such as public swimming pools, Queen Elizabeth Stadium, the Coliseum, and Wan Chai Sports Ground.
He studied at Hong Kong’s La Salle College and St Joseph’s Seminary in Macau, and excelled at hockey.
Sales played a major role in creating the Amateur Sports Federation & Olympic Committee of Hong Kong in 1950, becoming its president and giving Hong Kong athletes the opportunity to represent the then British colony in international sporting competitions – including the Olympics – as a separate entity. Previously, Hong Kong’s top athletes would play under the China or Taiwan flags.
In one of the most famous incidents, he negotiated with Black September terrorists at the 1972 Munich Olympics in Germany, helping the Hong Kong team escape the athletes’ village where they had shared accommodation with the Israeli athletes. Eleven Israeli athletes were killed in the attack. March 6.
Kenny Rogers, 81. The Grammy-winning balladeer spanned jazz, folk, country and pop with such hits as Lucille , Lady and Islands in the Stream . He embraced his persona as T he Gambler on records and TV. March 20.
Bill Withers, 81. He wrote and sang a string of soulful songs in the 1970s that have stood the test of time, including Lean on Me , Lovely Day and Ain’t No Sunshine . March 30.
2020 in review: What happened in Hong Kong
April
Stirling Moss, 90. A daring, speed-loving Englishman regarded as the greatest Formula One driver never to win the world championship. April 12.
Irrfan Khan, 54. A veteran character actor in Bollywood movies and one of India’s best-known exports to Hollywood. April 29. Colon infection.
Gerard McCoy, 63. A barrister and constitutional law expert who defended political activists as well as some of Hong Kong’s most notorious killers. Known as the “best legal brain–” in the city. April 30. Leukaemia.
Rishi Kapoor, 67. A top Indian actor who was a member of Bollywood’s most famous Kapoor family. April 30. Leukaemia.
May
Little Richard, 87. He was one of the chief architects of rock ’n’ roll whose piercing wail, pounding piano and famous hairstyle irrevocably altered popular music while introducing Black R&B to white America. His hits include Good Golly Miss Molly , Hound Dog . May 9. Bone cancer.
Jerry Stiller, 92. The high-strung Frank Costanza on the classic sitcom Seinfeld and the basement-dwelling father-in-law on The King of Queens. May 11.
Stanley Ho Hung-sun, 98. Macau’s casino tycoon was, for a long time, one of the richest men in Asia. He was born into a wealthy Eurasian family in Hong Kong. But when his family fell on hard times, he became ill with beriberi, a disease caused by not having enough to eat. When girls asked him to buy them coffee, he would run away because he didn’t have the money.
He went to Macau during the second world war with only HK$10 in his pocket. When he retired in 2018, his personal fortune was estimated to be worth HK$50 billion. His casino business dominated Macau for decades. May 26.
Little Richard was famous for popularising R&B music in the US.
June
Vera Lynn, 103. The endearingly popular “Forces’ Sweetheart” who sang in front of British troops during the second world war. Her hits included We’ll Meet Again and The White Cliffs of Dover. June 18.
July
Ennio Morricone, 91. The Oscar-winning Italian composer who created the coyote-howl theme for the iconic Western The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and soundtracks for such classic Hollywood gangster movies as The Untouchables and Once Upon A Time In America. July 6. Complications from surgery after a fall.
Naya Rivera, 33. A singer and actor who played a gay cheerleader on the hit TV musical comedy Glee. July 8. Drowning.
Olivia de Havilland, 104. The doe-eyed actress beloved to millions as the sainted Melanie Wilkes of the very unPC (not politically correct) Gone With the Wind , but also a two-time Oscar winner and an off-screen fighter who challenged and unchained Hollywood’s contract system. July 26.
Lee Teng-hui, 97. A former Taiwanese president who brought direct elections and other democratic changes to the self-governed island despite missile launches and other fierce sabre-rattling by China. July 30.
The best Young Adult novels of 2020
August
Benny Chan Muk-sing, 58. A Hong Kong film director responsible for several of the best Hong Kong action movies in the past 30 years. His hits include A Moment of Romance and New Police Story. August 24. Cancer.
Chadwick Boseman, 43. He played Black American icons Jackie Robinson and James Brown with searing intensity before inspiring audiences worldwide as the regal Black Panther in Marvel’s blockbuster movie franchise. August 28. Colon cancer.
September
Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 87. The US Supreme Court justice developed a cult-like following over her more than 27 years on the bench, especially among young women who appreciated her lifelong, fierce defence of women’s rights. September 18.
Timothy Ray Brown, 54. He made history as “the Berlin patient”, the first person known to be cured of HIV infection. September 29. Leukaemia.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg was seen as an icon and defender of women's rights.
October
Kenzo Takada, 81. The iconic French-Japanese fashion designer whose styles used bold colour and clashing prints that were inspired by his travels all over the world. October 4. Coronavirus.
Eddie Van Halen, 65. The guitar virtuoso whose blinding speed, control and innovation propelled his band Van Halen into one of hard rock’s biggest groups. Their hits included Jump and You Really Got Me Now. October 6. Cancer.
Johnny Nash, 80. A singer-songwriter, actor and producer who rose from pop crooner to early reggae star to the creator and performer of the million-selling anthem I Can See Clearly Now . October 6.
Lee Kun-hee, 78. The tycoon behind South Korean electronics giant Samsung. October 25. Heart attack.
Sean Connery, 90. The charismatic Scottish actor who rose to international superstardom as the suave secret agent James Bond and then abandoned the role to carve out an Oscar-winning career in other rugged roles. October 31.
November
Diego Maradona, 60. The Argentine soccer great who scored the notorious “Hand of God” goal at the 1986 World Cup before leading his country to the title at the same competition. Later, he struggled with cocaine addiction and obesity. November 25. Heart attack.
December
Chuck Yeager, American Air force officer and test pilot. The first man to break the sound barrier. December 7.
John le Carre, 89. AKA David John Moore Cornwell was known for his spy novels.
Jeremy Bulloch, 75. The British actor who played badass bounty hunter Boba Fett in the original Star Wars films. Even though it was a minor role, Boba Fett became a firm favourite among Star Wars fans. Bulloch rocked the costume so well and his ship, Slave 1, was so awesome that the part changed his life forever. May the force be with you always. December 17.
'Saaho' Director Sujeeth Ties The Knot Amid Covid-19 Pandemic
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Mumbai, Aug 3 (IANS) Filmmaker Sujeeth, who is best known for directing the Prabhas-starrer, Saaho, has tied the knot with fiancee Pravallika in a low key affair, amid the ongoing pandemic.
Several pictures from Sujeeth’s wedding ceremony are doing the rounds on the internet. While the filmmaker dons a traditional dhoti-kurta ensemble, Pravallika looked graceful in a pink saree.
The couple got engaged in June. Fans wished the newlyweds a happy married life.
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–IANS
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