Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
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COVID LATEST
The leaders of the Covid vaccine roll-out in the district are hopeful of inoculating the most vulnerable residents by the Government’s mid-february target.
People in the 70-74 age group are now being invited for jabs, with most older patients having already been offered one. The vaccine teams across Canterbury, Herne Bay and Whitstable are now over halfway to inoculating more than 30,000 patients by the deadline.
And they are confident the ambitious target can be achieved, barring any issues with supply.
Nurse Judith Marsh, coordinating the roll-out for the Canterbury South Primary Care Network (PCN), says deliveries of the vaccine are often only confirmed 24 to 48 hours beforehand. “This makes planning clinics a challenge as we have to mobilise our teams very quickly but we have done this every week since December 21 and all our staff have been fantastic to make this happen,” she said.
Her team has now administered 4,430 vaccines in total, including the majority of the over-80s. Some people in this age group have declined the jab, while others have had to wait four weeks after having tested positive for Covid. Most of the people aged 75-79 in the south of the city have now had the jab too and vaccines have been offered to all residents of the area’s care home.
Mrs Marsh says they are on track to hit the Government’s target and are now concentrating on calling in their 70-74 age group and extremely vulnerable patients for vaccines. In the north of the city, almost all over-80s have been vaccinated, along with 52% of the 75-79s, and 70% of care home residents and staff, according to Northgate Medical Practice’s Facebook page. Regarding patients aged 70-74, it added that the team is “still awaiting confirmation of the vaccine supply and delivery to enable us to complete this group in line with the Government target”. The Whitstable PCN team has vaccinated 6,708 patients - with another 2,400 done by close of play on Saturday. Dr John Ribchester, who is co-ordinating the town’s rollout, said: “Assuming deliveries happen like they’re supposed to, by close of play on February 13 we’ll have vaccinated all of groups one to four, which is more than 10,000 patients.”
In Herne Bay, about 7,000 people have had the jab. Clinics are running every day this week, with the aim of inoculating 2,500 more people by Sunday, leaving between 1,000 to 1,500 to be done next week. Dr Jeremy Carter, leading the Herne Bay PCN, said: “We’re confident we’ll have given the vaccine to everyone in the top four priority groups that want it.
“As long as we get the vaccine that we need next week, I’m confident we’ll do that.”