Jonathan Van-Tam has sent a powerful message to Premier League players urging them to get vaccinated against the coronavirus.
Van-Tam claimed earlier this week that vaccines have saved 112,000 lives and averted 24 million cases of COVID in the United Kingdom.
However, concerns have been raised at the uptake of the vaccine within football, with some reports claiming players and staff are cautious against taking it.
Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Newcastle boss Steve Bruce have both admitted that some of their players have so far declined to take the vaccine.
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But in a forthright message as part of a link up with the Premier League, the deputy chief medical officer has urged players to ignore the myths around the vaccine and become vaccinated.
“The best protection for you and for everyone — and I’m not mincing my words here — is the vaccine,” Van-Tam said in quotes published by the Mail on Sunday. “I’m going to give you some scientific facts which I think you as professional footballers need
Before he continued: “A few footballers have been hospitalised with Covid. This is not a joke.
“If you have two doses of Pfizer, it will cut your chances of being ill by 85 per cent and cut your chances of ending up in hospital or dying by 95 per cent.
“It should be pretty obvious that if you don’t get Covid, you can’t get long Covid. And you don’t want long Covid if you’re a top sportsman.”
Van Tam then added: “If you're double-jabbed, you don’t need to isolate any longer if you’re the close contact of a positive case.
“All you have to do is to ensure your tests keep coming back negative. That means you’ll miss less training and games.
“Many countries insist on a Covid passport for travel and it’s going to be difficult for players to (play in) European and international fixtures unless they are double-jabbed.”
Van-Tam has also stressed there are no animal products in vaccines and no alcohol in the Pfizer vaccine.
“It was developed quickly, no question about that,” he said. “But no short cuts were taken in terms of the standards that had to be passed.
“Some of the Covid vaccines do contain trace amounts of alcohol. But the Pfizer vaccine, which is the one that you’re most likely to be given in the UK if you’re under 40 years of age, has absolutely no alcohol in it. And there are no animal products in any of the Covid vaccines that we are using in the UK.”
