Soaring demand causing shortage of flu jab appointments across England

Key Highlights

• But latest figures from UKHSA show markedly low vaccination rates in some at-risk groups, with only 35.6% of pregnant women and 37.4% of under-65s with one or more long-term health conditions vaccinated, compared with 71.7% of over-65s. On Wednesday, , the World Health Organization said that 27 out of 38 countries in its European region have high or very high levels of flu. Hans Henri Kluge, the WHO regional director for Europe, said a new strain of flu was driving infections and “now accounts for up to 90% of all confirmed influenza cases in the European region”. The UK flu season started four to five weeks earlier than usual and has been dominated by a strain of H3N2 that has acquired new mutations since this year’s vaccine was produced.
• This prompted fears that the UK could be heading for a once-in-a-decade flu surge.
• However, the latest data suggests that this could simply be an early flu season – possibly due to waning immunity in the community to H3N2, which was last the dominant strain in 2021-22 – rather than an especially bad season.
• The vaccine is also providing relatively good protection, despite not being ideally matched. Vaccination can reduce the risk of serious ill health from flu, but when the Guardian tried to book an appointment in London, Manchester and Birmingham for an over-65 patient, there were almost no bookable appointments at many branches of Boots, Superdrug, or Tesco’s in-store pharmacies.
• The only availability we found on the day of research in larger stores in these cities was for Boots Long Acre in London and Superdrug in Manchester Piccadilly. For pregnant women and patients under 65 with an underlying health condition, there are even fewer bookable appointments.