Classification: Official
Publication reference: PRN00973

To:

• Integrated care board (ICB):
  •  chief executives
  • medical directors
  • chief nurses
  • chief pharmacists
• NHS trusts and foundation trusts:
  • chief executives
  • medical directors
  • chief nurses
  • directors of midwifery
  • chief pharmacists
• Primary Care Networks

cc.

• Regional
  • directors
  • directors of commissioning
  • chief midwives
  • lead obstetricians
  • chief pharmacists
• NHS England:
  • chief nurse network
  • AHP network

Dear colleague,

Flu and COVID-19 vaccinations for eligible frontline health and social care staff

Thank you for your continued commitment to all routine and seasonal vaccination programmes, and for your work to support the offer of winter vaccines for frontline health and care professionals.

All eligible frontline health and social care professionals, including clinical and non-clinical staff who have direct contact with patients, should be offered both the flu and COVID-19 vaccines ahead of winter. Employers must make every effort to ensure that eligible frontline staff are offered and easily able to access their vaccine, and are encouraged to do so.

NHS England will soon begin to publish monthly vaccine uptake data for frontline staff, at trust level. This data, which has been routinely published by UKHSA in previous years with a three-week lag, will now allow earlier insight into staff uptake (reducing lag to less than a week) and will be improved with the addition of a new filter to indicate those eligible. The first such data will be published shortly.

Everyone eligible for seasonal vaccines, including health and care workers, will be able to make bookings online at www.nhs.uk/wintervaccinations or on the NHS App until 14 December.

To maximise protection for your teams, patients and the public, we ask that all NHS organisations also ensure that convenient and clearly signposted local flu and COVID-19 vaccination arrangements remain in place for eligible frontline professionals until 31 January 2024, which may include local booking systems.

To support this, we urge all systems and NHS employers to keep encouraging eligible frontline team members to come forward for their winter vaccines. This should include by:

• ensuring flexibility to attend appointments conveniently around shifts
• offering drop-in sessions to discuss any questions
• involving staff networks, chaplaincy services and a wide range of local leaders and vaccine champions to encourage understanding and uptake
• making full use of online NHS campaign resources and promoting vaccine awareness regularly at team meetings, in newsletters and other local settings.

Larger provider organisations should try to ensure they maintain a wide-ranging offer, with options out of hours and across multiple sites, backed up by drop-in/pop-up sessions or roving vaccinations.

We also ask systems to continue identifying opportunities to maximise the offer of co-administration of flu and COVID-19 vaccinations in a single visit, to improve convenience and uptake during the busy winter period.

Once again, thank you for everything you are doing to keep our staff protected and to keep the NHS strong over winter.

Yours sincerely,

Professor Sir Stephen Powis, National Medical Director, NHS England.
Dame Ruth May, Chief Nursing Officer, England.
Kate Brintworth, Chief Midwifery Officer for England, NHS England.
Suzanne Rastrick OBE, Chief Allied Health Professions Officer, England, NHS England.
David Webb, Chief Pharmaceutical Officer, NHS England.
Steve Russell, Chief Delivery Officer, NHS England.