Queen Elizabeth II has encouraged everyone to have the coronavirus vaccine, saying people who refuse it “ought to think about other people rather than themselves.” The Monarch made the comments during a zoom call with senior health officials responsible for overseeing delivery of the United Kingdom’s vaccination programme.
It’s the first time Her Majesty the Queen has spoken publicly about COVID-19 vaccinations.
This is being considered a fairly major intervention by Her Majesty the Queen; the decision to talk about the coronavirus vaccination programme in the UK and to pass such strong opinion on it, urging all people to have the coronavirus vaccine when offered it.
The Queen has had the vaccination alongside her husband Prince Philip the Duke of Edinburgh, who is still in hospital in Central London being treated for an infection.
The Queen spoke about her experience of the injection delivered by household doctors at Windsor Castle in January, saying it was relatively quick and painless. Afterwards, she had a sense of being ‘protected’ and that she thinks is something everyone should have.
This will have a pretty significant boost to the wider health community in the UK.
There has been a hesitancy of uptake among certain parts of the community, particularly black ethnic minority communities. Just 72% of people within those communities said they would definitely have the vaccine.
So this Royal seal of approval, if you like, is certainly going to be seen as encouragement for those people to now take that up.
– Reporting by Laura Makin-Isherwood.
