Health bosses have hailed ‘phenomenal progress’ in Trafford’s vaccine roll-out.
More than eight in 10 (82 per cent) of all eligible adults across the borough have now had at least their first dose of a coronavirus vaccine.
Of these, 86 per cent have had both doses.
Rebecca Demaine of Trafford Clinical Commissioning Group gave an update to Trafford Council’s public engagement board meeting this morning.
READ MORE: Hauliers jailed over faulty lorry crash that killed two Manchester men on M62
In it, she said: “It’s quite phenomenal progress. Staggeringly, we’ve got 97.7 per cent of over 80s vaccinated.
“I don’t think there’s ever been performance like that across a vaccination programme so that’s fantastic.
“And 98.2 per cent of care home residents are vaccinated.”
She explained a maximum of four care homes in Trafford currently have a vaccination rate of less than 80 per cent of their staff – something the CCG is required to report into Greater Manchester board meetings about on a weekly basis.
Trafford CCG completed its first ‘pop-up’ vaccination clinic at Kellogg’s in Trafford Park a fortnight ago which was also labelled ‘a huge success’.
Ms Demaine explained they had both first and second doses of Pfizer and Astra Zeneca vaccines available on the day and the team were able to deliver around 150 vaccinations there.
The possibility of rolling out pop-up vaccination centres to other businesses across the borough, such as the Trafford Centre and sports venues dotted throughout Trafford is being looked at.
There has been a slow down in uptake as the vaccine programme moves through the younger population, which Ms Demaine explained was not entirely unexpected.
She added: “It’s not come as any surprise, it’s not something that we hadn’t planned for or unique to Trafford. It’s a regional and national issue.”
Preparations to roll out a covid booster jab over the winter are also under way.
Guidance was issued nationally a fortnight ago and Ms Demaine explained the booster is likely to be offered in line with the original priority cohorts that were used to roll-out the first dose and second dose of the jab.
Booster jabs are set to be given to patients from September onwards.
The idea is to see administration of the covid-19 booster jab and the flu vaccine to be running in parallel.
