For all the people who don’t seem to understand why the vaccine booster roll out is not going as quickly as they seem to expect, a few reasons.
1. The government and their advisors dithered as to whether it was going to do boosters or not, with final decisions not being made until the second week in September.
2. Meanwhile, the primary vaccine programme was running out of steam with many centre's open and very few people turning up. An over supply, if you like.
3. Planning started for phase 3 (boosters) but nobody knew what they were actually planning for. Would it be over 80’s, over 70’s, 60’s or 50’s. What about children (definitely not was the line)?
4. Vaccination centres started to close down as many were costing money and also wanted to go back to their primary purpose.
5. Primary care meanwhile was being told it was useless and needed to prioritise seeing patients.
6. Booster decision comes in for over 50’s and clinically vulnerable. Priority is decided to be care homes, done by GP’S!
7. Problem there is that they’ve been told to do their ‘real job’ and, all the boosters are MRNA vaccines and need a 15 minute observation, not straight in and out, like first time round with AZ.
8. People have not been coming forward in the numbers hoped for and people aren’t allowed to book before 190 days after jab number 2 happened.
9. All this is 3 weeks after the decision to jab 16/17 year olds.
10. One week after the booster programme is started, 12-15 year olds can be jabbed.
The workforce expected to do all this is the same one, only it’s now much smaller than 6 months ago and there are less places to do it in. GP’s aren’t terribly interested in the main, and who can blame them?
The reason for the comparatively slower uptake of the boosters is mainly to do with some reticence on the part of the population and the various logistics involved.
Finally, an announcement on 40-49 year olds wouldn’t be a great surprise next week..
