Updated 26/02/2021 12:52 GMT
NHS Cohort Rules Are Risking Vaccine Wastage, Medics Fear
Those giving out the jab are calling on the NHS to let them vaccinate more widely as they run out of eligible patients.
The NHS could be forced to waste coronavirus vaccines if it does not offer leeway for medics to vaccinate beyond the designated at-risk groups.
The current cohort is group seven of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s priority list, which takes in 60- to 64-year-olds. Over-65s, health workers, the clinically vulnerable, and care home residents should already have been offered the jab.
But the success and speed of the vaccination programme has seen some of those delivering it left with empty clinics and spare doses after reaching the end of the list for their eligible cohorts, and now medics are asking for permission to continue vaccinating into the next group should that occur.
Behind the scenes of Britain’s vaccine frontline
The success of the Covid vaccination rollout is providing a bright light and hope that lockdown won t last forever
People queue at a vaccination centre in Folkestone during England’s third lockdown
Credit: Gareth Fuller/PA
Venues all over the country, including churches, stately homes, pubs, restaurants and cinemas, are opening their doors so they can operate as vaccination centres. Medical staff and volunteers have even reported a party atmosphere as people queue up to get their jabs, with many donning sequins and glitter, and a general air of optimism. We talk to those on all sides of the programme.
Like so many people, I ve spent the past few months almost entirely within the four walls of my home.
In my case, in the bosom of my immediate family: a football-obsessed husband working from home, and two teenagers who are both permanently plugged into their devices.
Our isolation was made even more claustrophobic over Christmas when my daughter, 15, succumbed to Covid.
Desperate for some laughter and gossip – a virtual vestige of my old social life – I logged on to a closed group of old friends on Facebook.
I found them avidly discussing the extraordinary story of Hilaria Baldwin, the yoga instructor and lingerie-clad Instagram-influencer wife of US actor Alec Baldwin.