Winter Covid booster roll out aims to increase uptake

The booster campaign was due to start next month, but the emergence of a new strain - BA2.86, has brought the roll out forward, and it began in care homes on Monday.

Although there is little data yet available on the severity of the new strain, it has been found to have 30 mutations. As a precaution, it has been decided nationally to begin giving vulnerable people their booster earlier than planned.

At a meeting of the Bradford and Airedale Health and Wellbeing Board on Tuesday, members heard that there could be some delays to the rollout, caused by incorrect labels and getting vaccines out fast enough to meet the new timetable.

A report to the board said one focus of the winter campaign will be to try and increase uptake in areas of the District with a traditionally low response to vaccine campaigns.

These areas are also some of the most deprived in the District.

It said there is £360,000 available to run engagement and outreach programmes to encourage vaccine uptake.

The report adds: “We already have some proposals for such activities, but the accelerated timeline is creating an additional complexity to provide a comprehensive plan of events.

“Rimmingtons Pharmacy (in Bradford city centre) will be a prime provider of vaccine and vaccination resource to support these activities.”

The roll out will start with care homes and people who are housebound. Other eligible groups will begin to be invited to get their top up protection from next week.

At the meeting Phillipa Hubbard, deputy chief executive of the Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We have areas that we want to focus on.

“We’re in our third year of doing this now, so we know how it works. The difference now is that it is being delivered through Primary Care Networks and community pharmacies.

“We need to reach out to our communities to make sure they are aware of the programme.”

Members were told the booster rollout was originally due to begin in October, but the emergence of a new strain of Covid meant these plans were brought forward nationally.

As with the other booster programmes, the initial push will be to vaccinate people in care homes.

Sarah Muckle, director of public health at Bradford Council, said: “We’re doing this vaccine programme quicker than we intended to.

“We’ve been told we might have gaps in vaccine availability, not because the vaccines are unavailable, but because of the speed we are able to get them out.

“It is about distribution, and being able to respond fast enough.

“There was also an issue vaccines being mislabelled, meaning the original labels had to come off and get replaced.”

She elaborated that the mistake was due to an incorrect use by date being printed on vaccine labels. The issue was a national, rather than a local one.

A previous year's Covid booster campaign (Image: newsquest)

Mrs Muckle added: “There is also a new type of vaccine that is said to be more suitable for the new variant.

“With the booster programme you won’t know which vaccine you’re getting. It may be that the people who are clinically most at risk from this variant might benefit more from the new vaccine. They may find they are invited for a dose of the new vaccine, even if they have already had a booster.”

The meeting was told that vaccine take up was particularly low some of Bradford’s most deprived areas, and among certain ethnic groups.

Humma Nizami of the Race Equality Network said: “We need to increase vaccine uptake in some of our communities, including the Bangladeshi community. We’ve put a lot of work in to understand issues that prevent this, such as conspiracy theories.

“We have to look at the barriers that are preventing the take up of flu, Covid and MMR vaccines in these areas.”

Bradford Council Leader Susan Hinchliffe said: “We know from the Pandemic that the people who suffer from inequalities the most are less likely to get vaccines.”

People will be able to book their jabs from September 18 through the NHS website, the NHS App or by calling 119.

Eligible groups may also be offered a vaccination sooner by GP surgeries or other local NHS services.