England star Moeen Ali throws support behind vaccination programme

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England all-rounder Moeen Ali has urged the British Asian community to embrace Covid-19 vaccination and ignore “conspiracy theories”.

Moeen tested positive for the virus at the start of England’s Test tour of Sri Lanka earlier this month and was forced to spent almost a fortnight in isolation after experiencing headaches and fatigue.

He has since recovered to rejoin the squad ahead of the series in India and accepted an invitation from actor Adil Ray to participate in a video message aimed at dispelling myths around the vaccination programme.

Among the famous faces involved included London Mayor Sadiq Khan, comedians Sanjeev Bhaskar and Meera Syal and journalist Rageh Omaar.

Speaking from England’s latest period of quarantine in Chennai, Moeen acknowledged the hesitancy some might feel but stressed the importance of trusting the professionals.

“I’d take it and I’d urge others to do it,” he said.

“Having spoken to people who know quite a bit about it, I’d take it and get my family and others to take it.

“It’s like any vaccine, there’s a lot of conspiracy theories out there but it’s just medicine evolving.

“In our community people are sometimes not sure whether to take something – a bit cautious – but for things to get back to normal, it’s important that we do it.”

Detailing his personal experience of the virus, which he believes he picked up in transit from his Birmingham home to Hambantota, Moeen said: “I had loss of taste for a day or so, splitting headaches for three days, my body was very sore and I’ve never experienced that sort of tiredness before in my life. It was three days feeling pretty rough.

“I didn’t want the cough and fever and thankfully I didn’t have that. There’s part of you that’s worried and anticipating it would be bad.”

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