Senior Tory MP argues that booster rollout risks already ‘exhausted’ NHS

Fourth, fifth and sixth Covid doses must be prepared for future waves, a Conservative MP has said this morning.

Chair of the defence select committee, Tobias Ellwood MP, says he will vote against this evenings Plan B measures, and complained that a focus on the booster rollout “will place further strain on our already exhausted NHS infrastructure”.

Data released by NHS England last week showed that a record 5.98 million people were awaiting routine surgery in October, up from 5.83million in September.

“I think we should be looking in years, not in months,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. “We are going to need a fourth, a fifth, a sixth jab in readiness for further waves. We created a Brexit department, we created a climate change department.

“Why not create a new department with a Secretary of State with a new bespoke infrastructure, with a standalone national vaccination workforce? That’s what I’d like to see.”

He also hit out at vaccines passport plans, explaining: “You can go into a large venue with a recent negative lateral flow test, again that makes sense. But you can also show up if you had proof of having two jabs, which may have been completed at least six months ago. So even with this new mutation you could still be carrying Covid.”