City’s park-and-ride site is one of 10 new vaccination centres

A NEW mass vaccination centre has opened in Yorkshire.

It is in the park-and-ride at Askham Bar, just off the A64, in York.

The centre is one of 10 new mass vaccination sites which opened across England yesterday.

People aged 80 or over, who live up to a 45-minute drive from a centre, are being offered the choice of arranging a jab through the national booking service. Anyone not wanting to travel can wait to be contacted by their GP-led vaccination service or hospital.

Part of Elland Road stadium in Leeds will be transformed into a Covid-19 vaccination centre in the coming weeks.

It is one of four large vaccination sites being set up in West Yorkshire, with Jacob’s Well, Bradford, The John Smith’s Stadium, Huddersfield, and Spectrum Community

Healthcare CIC, Wakefield, also confirmed as vaccination centres.

Meanwhile, a vaccination centre set up in a cathedral crypt is a “sign of hope”, a dean has said.

Patients began receiving their Covid-19 vaccines at Blackburn Cathedral, in Lancashire, yesterday as it became one of the latest large-scale centres to open its doors.

Dean of the cathedral, the Very Reverend Peter Howell-Jones, said: “I think to see the building being used in the way that it is offering a sign of hope.

“Of course, church buildings generally are perceived as places that are welcoming and signs of hope so it just comes together in a really positive way for us.”

He said the cathedral community was “delighted” to be able to host the vaccination centre.

He added: “This is most unusual for the cathedral to be embracing.”