Irish Examiner view: Availability of vaccines is all-defining in our fight against Covid

It's not about being hypochondriacs but we need to avoid situations that endanger wellbeing or health

We all know people who, if not an irredeemable hypochondriac, will if allowed indulge that foible to the very edge of reason. We all know people who imagine that they are but one more sniffle away from that inevitable assignation at the pearly gates. 

Huge energy is wasted fighting imagined ailments. Unlike the farrier Felix Randal, finally laid low by four fatal disorders, they can imagine the caress of a draught as the arrival of something exotic and unknown, but certainly fatal. 

Today those people will recoil from even the idea of a rasher of bacon after Leeds University researchers published a report that warned, by eating a single rasher every day, the risk of dementia was increased by 44%.

The long-term project has strongly linked foods such as sausages, kebabs, burgers, or nuggets with deteriorating brain health in middle or old age. 

Meat producers need not, unlike meat processors, despair. The study found that daily consumption of non-processed red meats, such as beef, pork or veal, may have a protective effect against dementia. 

Tempting as it might be to josh your local hypochondriac about any new-found aversion to a salty but sweet rasher, maybe this is a moment to copy their reticence and ape their default avoidance of situations that might endanger wellbeing or health.

The closure of a school in Tipperary and a creche in Offaly over Covid-19 underlines the need at this juncture to be more a hypochondriac than a hail fellow well met. 

It was inevitable that there would be Covid-19 cases linked to schools, but how they are managed will be definitive.

That seems especially so as there is a startling and current example of what happens when societies imagined as adult have to declare a state of emergency after more than 1,000 arrests were made during a students’ unruly spring break. 

Florida’s Miami Beach saw more than 1,000 arrests and officials extended a highly unusual 8pm curfew for another week. 

Officials warned that it may be extended again, but they clarified that the crowd was not made up of students but rather adults hoping to enjoy one of the few American states to remain fully open during the pandemic.

The Miami Beach restrictions are more severe than any imposed here — yet — but Taoiseach Micheál Martin was equally forceful on Monday when he urged people to avoid indoor gatherings “at all costs” as virus rates remain stubbornly high. 

Speaking ahead of a key EU summit this week, Mr Martin insisted that all over-70s will be fully vaccinated by mid-May and their first vaccine by mid-April is on target.

Our vaccine rollout is frustratingly slow. 

There are obvious reasons, but not all are acceptable — a niggling reality sharpened by Boris Johnson’s gloating comparison of British and EU schemes.

The EU blundered on vaccines, but it is possible that Britain’s supplies might be curtailed unless it plays its part in agreed procedures. 

Nevertheless, the grim news about a daily rasher can be off set against the possibility that Russia may supply us with Sputnik V vaccines after our American friends were unable to do so and our EU colleagues were too disorganised to do so. 

Ardent hypochondriacs might say “nyet”, but the majority would jump at the opportunity.