Rishi Sunak may have to use health and social care levy to pay for Covid booster jab programme
Rishi Sunak may be forced to use new health and social care levy to pay for £5billion-a-year permanent programme for Covid booster jabs
Health and social care levy will raise £12bn a year for NHS and social care reformGovernment passed plans for 1.25 per cent National Insurance increase this yearSources say additional cash could be used to fund indefinite booster programmeIt comes as experts say Covid is now expected to be ‘dominant’ in our lives than had been thought initially which prompted the Treasury to reassess its spending
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Chancellor Rishi Sunak may have to use the new health and social care levy intended to raise £12billion a year for the NHS and adult social care reforms to fund an indefinite booster programme instead.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak may have to use the new health and social care levy intended to raise £12billion a year for the NHS and adult social care reforms to fund an indefinite booster programme.
As cases of the highly transmissible Omicron variant continue to sweep across the UK, it is understood the Treasury is drawing up plans to ensure adults are jabbed at least every three to six months.
The booster programme, which could cost as much as £5billion a year, may stay in place indefinitely in order to keep on top of any dangerous mutations that appear in the future, according to the Sunday Times.
The newspaper reports that it is understood the health and social care levy, intended to raise £12billion a year for the NHS and adult social care reforms, will be used to fund the unexpected expense.
A treasury source told the paper: ‘The scientists all said, “Vaccines are going to mean you are home and dry, so spend billions on vaccines”, which is what we have done.
‘But if that has changed and this is basically life, the view is that every three to six months another one of these comes along and we are all going backwards.
‘If the assumptions have all changed, which it looks like they have, you quite quickly get to £4 billion or £5 billion per year, and that is just on vaccinations and boosters.’
Insiders added that Covid is going to be a ‘much more dominant feature of our lives than we had thought’ which is what has triggered the reappraisal of spending, according to the Times.
In September, the controversial reforms which will raised £12billion a year via a 1.25 per cent hike in national insurance was passed in the Commons despite a brewing Tory rebellion over the highest tax increase Britain has seen in 70 years.
The booster programme, which could cost as much as £5billion a year, may stay in place indefinitely in order to keep on top of any other mutations. Pictured: a booster clinic in London
Boris Johnson claimed the plans mean that nobody in England will have to pay more than £86,000 in their lifetime to fund their care in later life and the money is also expected to help tackle NHS waiting lists.
However, the Sunday Times reports it is already accepted that some of the cash will go towards a ‘permanent pandemic response’, including vaccinations, NHS Test and Trace and the new Health Security Agency with the booster programme eating into the fund further.
The Government instigated Plan B measures last week as the number of Omicron variant cases continues to increase, meaning the return of working from home and mandatory facemasks on public transport, in shops and theatres.
MPs are expected to vote for tougher Plan C Covid-19 restrictions on Tuesday, including ‘pub passports’, after pandemic modelling showed the Omicron variant could cause more hospitalisations than last winter.
However, Boris Johnson and Downing Street are said to be resisting Mr Gove’s calls for a new crackdown, as the Prime Minister faces a revolt from his own Conservative party in a vote over the introduction of Plan B rules.
A wave of infection is projected which could lead to a peak of more than 2,000 daily hospital admissions, with 175,000 hospital admissions and 24,700 deaths between December 1 this year and April 30 next year, even under the most optimistic scenario.
Even under the most optimistic of four scenarios modelled by experts – relating to how much Omicron might ‘escape’ vaccines and how effective booster jabs are – it’s predicted it could cause 25,000 deaths by the end of April without further social distancing restrictions.
The re-introduction of lockdown-style measures, similar to those endured last winter and spring, would mean Britain was ‘better able to mitigate this wave’, said Dr Nick Davies, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine LSHTM.
He stressed it was up to politicians to make the decisions, but added: ‘We do recognise that lockdowns have pretty devastating impacts on people’s lives.’
However, serious questions remain about how accurate the modelling is. For example, it assumes Omicron is equally as likely as the Delta variant to cause serious illness in people who had never been vaccinated or had a natural Covid infection.
By contrast, early data from South Africa – one of the first nations where Omicron was identified – and England suggests Omicron might be naturally less likely to cause serious disease than Delta.
