Knaresborough’s vaccination site today welcomed the first 12 to 15 year olds through its doors amid concern about high coronavirus cases in the Harrogate district.

The government initially said that all children in that age group would be offered jabs on school premises by half-term.

However, the roll-out in schools locally has been delayed due to staffing issues at Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust.

So the NHS has asked Homecare Pharmacy Services, which recently moved to the Chain Lane Community Hub in Knaresborough, to help out with the roll-out.

William Kean, 12, from Harrogate, was among the first of his cohort to get vaccinated today. He told the Stray Ferret:

“I was a little bit nervous but it was fine, it didn’t hurt very much. I thought it was going to be worse. Hopefully it means I don’t miss as much school now.”

The Homecare team at the launch of the new clinic today.

Local public health officials have linked the high rate of infection in the Harrogate district to children returning to school in September.

The director of public health for North Yorkshire, Louise Wallace, revealed last week that she had urged schools to bring back face masks and reduce after-school activities as a result.

Read more:

• Harrogate hospital staff shortages delay schools vaccine programme
• Harrogate district schools urged to bring back face masks

Jason Baskind, managing director of Homecare Pharmacy Services, told the Stray Ferret:

“Obviously the school teams have been struggling to get the children all done. The initial offer has got to be through schools.

“But the NHS has asked us and other vaccination centres to put on these clinics for children because it’s half-term and because of the situation in Harrogate.”

Sue Vasey, interim director at the Chain Lane Community Hub, added:

“It was really important for us to be able to offer this facility for such an important programme, particularly now when infection levels are so high in our area.

“We are always in need of volunteers but it’s a great atmosphere and a really good team. Everyone has really pulled together to make this work.”

Ripon Racecourse will reopen as a covid vaccination centre and Knaresborough’s York Road site will relocate for the vaccine booster programme.

The rollout of third doses to around 30 million people across the UK began this week.

Amanda Bloor, accountable officer for the NHS North Yorkshire Clinical Commissioning Group, said Ripon Racecourse will reopen as a vaccination centre and that Knaresborough’s York Road site at the former Lidl supermarket will move to the town’s Chain Lane Community Hub.

Speaking at a meeting of the North Yorkshire Local Resilience Forum today, Ms Bloor said these sites would help increase capacity and that other venues were being confirmed by NHS England.

She said:

“We are going to have a mix of venues delivering the booster programme – some of our practice sites will be delivering the vaccines and in addition there will also be a number of community pharmacy sites across North Yorkshire.

“The community pharmacy sites are managed by NHS England and are currently undergoing a site assurance process.

The old Lidl vaccination site in Knaresborough is relocating to the Chain Lane Community Hub from Tuesday. It will mean this site can significantly increase capacity.

Ripon Racecourse closed as a vaccination centre in July after being used for the first phase of the rollout, while Knaresborough’s York Road site is still being used.

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The rollout of booster jabs follows a recommendation from the government’s vaccine advisers, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), which said third doses should be given at least six months after a person has had their second – with the Pfizer-BioNTech jab recommended.

The recommendations come amid concern about waning immunity, with JCVI saying that it wanted to take the precautionary approach of boosters to ensure the most vulnerable people maintain high levels of protection.

Those eligible for the booster jabs include over-50s, younger adults with health conditions and frontline health and care workers.

Patients will be invited on a priority basis and they have been urged not to contact the NHS, but to wait to hear from the health service.

Ms Bloor added:

“The booster programme will be delivered as it was in phase one with the most vulnerable being invited first, so care home residents will be prioritised.

“Cohorts one to nine, in order, will be invited for a booster no earlier than six months from their second dose. The boosters will be by appointment only and there won’t be a drop-in service at this point.

Several clinics due to vaccinate people against flu in the Harrogate district have been cancelled or postponed.

One of the biggest providers of flu vaccines to the UK, Seqirus, confirmed delays in supplying the vaccines of up to two weeks due to “road freight delays” and “unexpected logistical challenges including transportation difficulties”.

This has disrupted some Harrogate GP surgeries scheduled flu vaccine clinics.

Patients have been advised they do not need to contact their surgeries, as their GP practice will be in touch with those affected.

The Stray Ferret has learned of the following changes. Other local surgeries may be affected.

• All appointments at a Ripon racecourse flu clinic on September 10 to 12 have been postponed by three weeks. Patients from a number of practices including Ripon Spa Surgery, North House Surgery, and Dr Ingram & Partners are affected.
• Church Avenue Medical Centre in Harrogate has contacted some patients to reschedule their appointments, but is awaiting new delivery dates from Seqirus before confirming new appointments.
• The Spa Surgery at Mowbray Square Medical Centre in Harrogate has also cancelled all appointments at its September 19 clinic. An update on the surgery’s Facebook page says the team will be in touch with patients when they can reschedule.
• Harrogate’s East Parade Surgery updated its website to say it will contact patients if their appointment has been affected, and to reschedule once stock is delivered.

The Spa Surgery took to Facebook to explain why vaccinations were delayed.

Read More: 

• Harrogate district covid rate increases as pupils head back to school

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The delay comes just days after routine blood tests were rearranged due to supply issues with blood test tubes.

Dr Gary Howsam, vice chair of the Royal College of GPs, which is the professional membership body for GPs in the UK, said:

“This is news we really didn’t want to hear. With over 36 million people eligible for the flu vaccine on the NHS this year, GPs need the supply chain to run like clockwork.

“Practices plan meticulously each year to deliver the flu vaccination programme on a mass scale and it is essential that as many people as possible in at-risk groups get their vaccination as early into the flu season as possible.

“A delay of even a couple of weeks is going to have a big impact on practices and their patients, especially when GPs are already dealing with the fallout caused by the shortage of blood test bottles and the anxiety this is causing.”

A Seqirus spokeswoman said:

“Vaccine supplies are now beginning to flow out across England and Wales this week and some practices and pharmacies will be able to begin their vaccination campaigns. We are working through various logistical issues and do not expect delays to extend beyond one to two weeks.”

Has your flu vaccination been postponed? Email us at contact@thestrayferret.co.uk.

District residents will be able to get vaccinated without appointments at a number of pop-up coronavirus clinics this weekend.

The clinics will open in Harrogate, Knaresborough and Pateley Bridge tomorrow and Sunday, and are part of a final push to get younger people vaccinated.

First and second doses will be offered to anyone aged over 18, while any care workers and those aged over 50 who have not yet taken up the opportunity to get vaccinated are also being urged to come forward.

The Wesley Centre on Oxford Street, Harrogate will offer first doses of the Pfizer vaccine on Saturday between 10am to 4pm.

In Knaresborough, the Homecare Pharmacy Vaccination Centre at the former Lidl site on York Road will offer first doses of the Moderna jab on Saturday and Sunday between 9am and 5pm.

And in Pateley Bridge, both first and second doses of the Pfizer vaccine will be available at Bishopside and Bewerley Memorial Hall on Park Road on Saturday between 8am and 5.50pm.

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Sue Peckitt, chief nurse at NHS North Yorkshire Clinical Commissioning Group, said:

“These walk-in clinics are aimed at those people who have not taken up the opportunity to book their vaccine via the NHS National Booking Service or NHS 119.”

Driven by the faster-spreading Delta variant, Harrogate’s weekly infection rate is approaching record levels with a current average of 416 cases per 100,000 people.

The highest rate on record was 497 at the beginning of January.

The rise in infections has been followed by a slight increase in hospital admissions with five patients in Harrogate on Wednesday, although the hospital has not recorded a Covid-related death in more than three months.

Louise Wallace, director of public health for North Yorkshire, said this was down to vaccines weakening the link between infections and serious illness, as she also urged people to make use of the pop-up clinics this weekend.

She said:

“Vaccination is the most effective way to reduce the risk of developing serious or life-threatening symptoms from coronavirus, as well as protecting others in the community.

“The vaccination programme in this country has been a huge success and the numbers of people becoming seriously ill, or dying, as a result of contracting the disease have fallen dramatically.

The trade union Unison has criticised MPs in the Harrogate district for voting in favour of compulsory vaccinations for care home staff.

MPs voted through plans to make it mandatory for staff who work in a Care Quality Commission-registered care home to have two jabs of a covid vaccine unless they have a medical exemption.

It will become law from October after the House of Commons last night approved the regulation by 319 votes to 246.

The district’s three Conservative MPs, Andrew Jones, Julian Smith and Nigel Adams all voted in favour of the move.

Read more:

• Knaresborough vaccine centre to hold first walk-in clinic this weekend
• Map shows second covid vaccine rate in Harrogate district
• Walk-in vaccine clinics in Harrogate, Knaresborough and Pateley Bridge this weekend

But the North Yorkshire branch of Unison tweeted:

“Concerning that Conservative MPs in our area voted to allow the state to mandate vaccination.

“We encourage all our members to get vaccinated, but making it law is not the way a liberal democracy should operate.”

Concerning that Conservative MPs in our area voted to allow the state to mandate #vaccination. We encouragr all our members to #GetVaccinated but making it the law is not the way a liberal democracy should operate. @nadams @AJonesMP @kevinhollinrake @RishiSunak @JulianSmithUK https://t.co/usBHo7oKvj

— North Yorkshire UNISON (@NYUnison) July 13, 2021

Unison was responding to a tweet by Rachael Maskell, the Labour MP for York Central, saying care staff “need respect” and she objected to mandatory vaccines.

She said:

“This authoritarian state is encroaching on human rights of others. What next?”

Some rebel Tory MPs said the government should have published an impact assessment before the vote, which ministers said was “being worked on”.

William Wragg, Conservative MP, said he was “in despair” and that the government was “treating this House with contempt”.

Care minister Helen Whately said managers could discuss the vaccine with staff or look at alternative roles for those who did not want to be vaccinated.

The Stray Ferret approached all three of the Harrogate district MPs for comment, but received no response.

The vaccination centres at the Great Yorkshire Showground in Harrogate and Ripon Races will close in August after clinical leaders decided they were no longer needed.

The two GP-led sites have administered more than 120,000 jabs so far. The Harrogate centre will close on August 13 and the Ripon site will close on August 31.

The pharmacy-led centres in Knaresborough and Pateley Bridge are set to play a larger role in the vaccine rollout as a result.

NHS England believes the pharmacy sites, along with regional vaccine hubs in Leeds and York, will provide more than enough capacity to administer vaccines after August.

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Dr Chris Preece, a GP partner at Church Lane Surgery in Boroughbridge and clinical director of the Knaresborough and Rural District Primary Care Network, said the vaccination programme in the Harrogate District had been “phenomenally successful”. He added:

“As the programme moves towards vaccinating younger and more mobile cohorts, we’re already seeing evidence that people are choosing to travel to one of the larger, regional vaccination hubs, rather than waiting to be contacted by their GP practice.

“We would like to place on record our extreme gratitude to the Yorkshire Events Centre and Ripon Racecouse for their support and the generous use of their facilities.”

Dr Ian Dilley, a GP partner at East Parade Surgery in Harrogate and clinical director of the Mowbray Square Primary Care Network added:

“With the huge number of people now vaccinated in the local area, we feel August is an appropriate end date.

“We need to be mindful of the other pressures that will be placed on doctors’ surgeries as we head towards autumn and winter, and the annual flu vaccine campaigns that GP practices need to provide.

“We also need to enable our kind hosts at the Yorkshire Events Centre and Ripon Racecourse to provide their own events as restrictions continue to be eased and more public events are permitted.”

The primary care networks will continue to run vaccination clinics from both the Harrogate and Ripon sites for the next three months,

Two vaccine centres in the Harrogate district are reopening after a month of supply issues slowed the rollout.

Homecare Pharmacy Services‘ clinic in the former Lidl car park in Knaresborough will operate on Saturday for the first time since April 17.

When it re-opens the pharmacy staff will be giving both the Pfizer-Biontech and Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines.

It will be open five days a week but the owners hope eventually to be open seven days a week.

Read more:

• No more first vaccines in Harrogate district until June, leaked letter reveals
• Harrogate district first covid vaccine doses near 100,000

Jason Baskind, managing director of Homecare Pharmacy Services, told the Stray Ferret:

“The last clinic we held was without a doubt the best so far. The team gelled well, there were no queues and we managed to give out 1,219 jabs.

“It was frustrating that we had to close after that but now we are back and we are ready to go, so let’s crack on.”

Pateley Bridge’s vaccine centre is also starting to see supplies come through. It opened on Wednesday this week to administer about 400 jabs.

The site, run by Pateley Bridge Pharmacy, had been in talks with the NHS about using the Pfizer-Biontech vaccine, which is more difficult to store.

However, because the site is small the owners did not want to risk wasting vaccines so it is sticking solely to Oxford-AstraZeneca.

The outlook has improved compared to last month, when a letter leaked to the Stray Ferret said there would be no more first doses for a while due to shortages.

Today is the last day of second vaccine appointments for frontline healthcare and social worker staff at Harrogate District Hospital.

Meanwhile, Public Health England has announced that only one more case of covid has been confirmed in the district, taking the total since the start of the pandemic to 7,643.

Read more: 

• Harrogate care home residents’ anger at isolation rule
• Harrogate hospital apologises as waiting list nears 16,000 patients

The district’s seven-day rate has declined slightly to 20.5. This is lower than the Yorkshire and the England rate, which both stand at 23.9.

No more deaths were reported in the district today.

The covid death toll at the hospital is therefore still at 179 in total.

A coronavirus vaccination centre will open in Pateley Bridge on Saturday.

Pateley Bridge Pharmacy, which will operate at Pateley Bridge and Bewerley Memorial Hall on Park Road, has the capacity to give up to 400 inoculations a day.

A technical glitch means the NHS website booking system is not currently offering the Pateley Bridge site as an option when it invites people to book inoculations.

The pharmacy has assured eligible people they can select the site either by dialling 119 or calling them directly on 01423 711329.

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It will be the fourth vaccination site in the Harrogate district, following the Great Yorkshire Showground in Harrogate, the racecourse in Ripon and the former Lidl in Knaresborough.

The pharmacy-led site will use the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine because it is easy to store and transport.

Samin Khan, who runs Pateley Bridge Pharmacy, previously told the Stray Ferret:

“We know that there is a need in rural areas. It took a bit of convincing but NHS England has now given us the go ahead.

“The hall is quite large. When we are up and running we will be able to vaccinate around 400 people a day.

“Pateley Bridge is a real community and it has taken a real community effort to organise.”

Health Secretary Matt Hancock has praised the speed of the covid vaccination rollout in the Harrogate district.

Responding to a question in the House of Commons yesterday from Harrogate and Knaresborough MP Andrew Jones, Mr Hancock said health staff in the district had done an “amazing job” delivering the vaccine.

He said it meant Harrogate had a higher number of residents vaccinated than the national average.

Mr Hancock said:

“May I put on the record my thanks to the team in Harrogate, who have done an amazing job vaccinating over 30,000 people — more than the national average, if my memory serves me correctly?

“I thank my honourable friend for his leadership in Harrogate and for supporting the team there to make this happen.”

Mr Jones had asked if the UK was on track to give everyone their second dose of the vaccine within 12 weeks of the first. Mr Hancock said it was.

Read more:

• Great Yorkshire Showground can give 1,800 vaccines in a day
• Harrogate district vaccine boost as over 50s prepare for jab

Data published last week by NHS England revealed that 48,000 people in the Harrogate district have now received one of the approved vaccines.

Harrogate, Ripon, and now Knaresborough, all have vaccination sites.

In an interview with the Stray Ferret, Dr Chris Preece, a GP partner in Boroughbridge and Knaresborough, said that Harrogate’s Great Yorkshire Showground site was able to carry out up to 1,800 vaccinations a day.