Amy Selman: Covid nearly killed my boss, but it’s the vaccine that has changed my life for the worse

Amy Selman worked for Boris Johnson during his time as London Mayor 

I, along with many of you, rolled up my sleeve for the COVID-19 Vaccinations as soon as they were offered in 2021.

This included the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine, a development and deployment exemplar led by scientist Dr Sarah Gilbert and Minister Nadhim Zahawi. A constructive Labour Party backed the vaccine roll-out. This British achievement offered protection and hope.

After my second dose, I fell ill. I was realistic: as with all new drugs, the AstraZeneca vaccine may cause side effects. Then my boyfriend noticed that I had lost my balance slightly and that my speech patterns were odd. We were alarmed. Fleeing to my family in Cheshire, my father asked why I had come down the stairs on my bottom?

“My legs don’t work”, I replied. Neighbouring doctors were consulted. All became frightened.

My limbs experienced scorching pain and spasms of paralysis, spreading from the furthest points of my toes and fingertips in towards my chest and heart. I spent ten months in hospital. For approximately fourteen thousand British citizens, the side effects from a COVID-19 vaccination were not swelling or a rash. They are life-changing disabilities.

The COVID-19 Pandemic of 2020 -2023 seems distant already. The ping alert for Zoom chats. The slightly rusty firepits in the garden.  The remnants of homeschooling art supplies happily shoved into a drawer when schools reopened.

To many though it will always be the present.

Those bereaved, those whose businesses folded, those whose health and happiness suffered. People from every different demographic group. For me it’s moments from that time that stand out as relevant to my life today

The then Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose alarming admission to hospital in April 2020 worried his friends and foes alike. I had worked for Boris for almost a decade during his time as Mayor of London. I worried right up until his July announcement of a UK Obesity startegy, headline, “I was too fat”. This made me laugh out loud. It had form, his war on obesity. Partly personal (the no-booze-no-biscuits but slightly-irritable campaign-diet), and more serious interventions on childhood obesity with Rosie Boycott.

The Labour MP Andrew Gwynne, who spoke out early about long covid, recognised by his local GP.

Knowing there were up to 1.9 million fellow sufferers.

The people like me who had had a serious reaction to a vaccination. I am now partially disabled and a wheelchair user. The auto-immune disease Guillain-Barré Syndrome has caused invisible disabilities: chronic fatigue, continence and digestive disorders. Nerve damage in my eyes and ears is now being uncovered. My senior neurologist believes that I have reached the end of my natural recovery.

This today then is the draining and demoralising state of play:

As a disabled citizen, I now have more interactions with the State than when I worked for it. Forms over 30 pages long, intrusive and confusing. Benefits that do not begin to cover my medical costs. Systems are not responsive, officers are too busy, local councils are complicated.

Facts and dates help.

My hospital records are clear: the date of admission, time spent on the stroke ward, the Intensive Care Unit, biopsy dates, my move to the neurological rehabilitation hospital.

There are happier memories. With COVID-19 restrictions in place, my family outside of the window holding up signs with birthday messages on, Love actually – style.

The days my parents could take me outside in the wheelchair, with my two Yorkshire Terriers smuggled onto hospital grounds!

Learning to cook again in Occupational Therapy and flummoxing them by asking for chicken livers and clarified butter.

Then there are the harder things. The sale of my flat and end of my London life (I could no longer pay the mortgage), the loving sting when he did not visit, a card from friends with children’s names I did not recognise.

However, the timeline of my quest to claim for my injuries is almost as long and certainly twice as upsetting.

I filed for the Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme (VDPS) on 25 April 2023. I have since had 35 interactions. My Caseworker (W) was assigned on 18/09/2023; by February 2024, he finally had all the information. The medical assessor in August requested *missing information. On 2 October 2024, I was informed that these records had been forwarded. The waiting continues.

My fear is big government can sometimes lead to bad judgements. This year, two campaigns have uncovered the role and response of Government(s) to similar.

The Infected Blood Inquiry found 30,000 NHS patients were infected with serious diseases. Persistent and personal journalism, including by Caroline Wheeler has kept this campaign afloat. The time period it took place: the 1970s-80s. The Inquiry commenced in 2017. In 2022 the first financial support package was agreed upon, with tight criteria and for £100,000.

The ITV drama, “Mr Bates v. The Post Office”, had a star cast, huge promotion and a primetime slot. Yet the actual story itself – of 700 postmasters wrongly prosecuted due to faulty computer accounting software – is what caught the public imagination. The investigations happened between 1999 – 2015. Alan Bates has been knighted but not offered a sensible financial payment. Jo Hamilton used the BAFTA Ceremony to inform people that 300 exonerated postmasters have not been paid.

One hero of the Post Office Scandal story was a Member of Parliament, James Arbuthnot. Today’s heroes include the Conservative MPs Sir Jeremy Wright and Christopher Chope, who have diligently raised the COVID-19 vaccine victims’ case through many parliamentary channels.

The former Health Secretary behaved callously in refusing to meet victims; kicking the compensation scheme off her desk with a ‘review’. In his first month in the job, now Minister Andrew Gwynne issued a parliamentary answer detailing what that had meant in practice: 1.3 per cent of the 6,850 applicants processed had been successful. Just 1.3 percent.

I hope that having to sign off on this answer led him to demand the full picture. In Opposition he fought our corner, arguing the VDPS was outdated (it is), the 60 per cent disablement threshold was ill-suited to chronic illness (it is), and the delays unfair to those suffering (they remain so).

The Labour Health Secretary Wes Streeting also offers hope. His public service is based on Christian values of: “love, compassion and care for others”. I also know he is not to be underestimated when he has a cause. I saw this as far back as 2014 when he manoeuvred a complicated rescue of Redbridge Cycling Club! He has met with the campaign and is considering a new, bespoke compensation scheme.

Across the Green Benches, Conservative Party Leader Kemi Badenoch will be excellent at holding the Government to account. She is also kind. As a new politician, she championed a forgotten group of rape victims. Her report Silent Sufferers secured a policy change and funding.

So I have a plea for our politicians. Please tackle our solvable problem, don’t ignore us.

Reform of the NHS, cutting benefits (PIP), re-examining COVID-corruption. These are Labour’s new and huge cross-government missions. They have the mandate but I am scared that our small cohort, attacked by visible and invisible disabilities, may disappear. The financial burdens of being adult-onset disabled are cumulative and are not covered by existing systems. We ask for consideration now – not in 20 years.

When he was PM, Boris Johnson wrote to Kate Scott, the wife of COVID-19 vaccine victim Jamie, with a pledge to help:

“You’re not a statistic, and must not be ignored.”

I recognise that Boris, and that spirit of British politics. I ask those with authority to act with timely compassion.

Please help us now.

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