NHS England, NHS Improvement, PHE and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care are thanking NHS staff for “their incredible work in achieving some of the highest ever vaccination rates for flu.”
In a statement, the organisations say that despite the complexities of rolling out the largest national NHS flu immunisation programme during a COVID-19 winter, NHS staff have vaccinated a record 80.3 per cent of people aged 65 years and over in England. This is the highest uptake ever achieved for this group and is almost 10 per cent higher than this time last year, exceeding the World Health Organization uptake target of 75 per cent.
Flu vaccine uptake rates are higher than the same time last season for all other eligible groups, including an uptake rate of 51.5 per cent in clinical at-risk groups, which is the highest achieved in the last seven seasons.
Uptake in two- and three-year-old children is also the highest ever recorded, at 54.0 and 56.5 per cent, respectively.
NHS England has achieved some of the highest flu vaccine uptake rates in Europe for health care workers, with an uptake of 74.3 per cent by the end of the season in 2019 to 2020. By the end of November 2020, 70.5 per cent of frontline health care workers had already been vaccinated, compared with 61.5 per cent at the same period last year.
PHE says these figures are a reflection of the hard work of the wide range of NHS and public health professionals involved in planning and delivering the national immunisation programme.
Dr Nikki Kanani, NHS national medical director for primary care, said: “The NHS has done an outstanding job in vaccinating a record number of people with flu and I congratulate staff for all of their fantastic efforts in achieving this as they continue to go above and beyond in these challenging times.”