We can’t avoid talk about the Covid 19 vaccination programme and its rollout. Staggeringly high numbers of the elderly people currently eligible for vaccination seem to have taken up the offer. We also hear, however, about conspiracy theories and Covid deniers and those who believe that the vaccine was approved after inadequate testing. So, what happened when a court was asked to rule on whether the vaccine should be given to an elderly woman suffering from dementia and schizophrenia and lacking capacity to consent to treatment.

The woman’s son objected to her receiving the vaccination and in E (vaccine) [2021] the court had to decide whether she should, nevertheless, be vaccinated. The decision is interesting in that the court tried do decide what the woman would have concluded had she been capacious. It attempted to look at her beliefs and values and to extrapolate from her previous behaviour. It transpired that she had previously accepted public health advice regarding vaccination programmes and had consented to flu jabs, that she had recently told her doctor that she wanted “whatever is best for me”. The court also looked at the risk posed to her by Covid 19. She was elderly and living in a care home and at high risk from Covid. The court ordered that it was in her best interests to be vaccinated and noted that it was not a finely balanced decision!

This one isn’t a lot of use to you for essays (unless you have to consider capacity) but it is super topical and we thought it was interesting!