Covid: Wales autumn boosters reach more than half over-65s

More than half of people aged over 65 in Wales have now had their Covid autumn booster jabs.

More than 585,000 boosters in total have been given out since the programme started in September, Public Health Wales vaccination figures show.

Wales has so far reached more in target groups such as care home residents and over-65s than equivalents in England.

A total of 53.5% of over-65s have been given a booster in Wales, compared to 32.6% in England.

But health officials are facing the challenge of persuading more vulnerable groups to take up the offer, with issues too around missed appointments.

Comparative figures for other target groups show nearly three-quarters of care home residents in Wales have now received autumn boosters.

This compares to less than half in England.

About one in five of the 50 to 64 age group had also been reached by 20 October.

There are some differences within parts of Wales, with more than three-quarters of the over-65s being reached already in the Vale of Glamorgan and nearly 70% in Cardiff.

This drops to around a third in Conwy and it's also less than 40% in Ceredigion and Carmarthenshire.

Nearly 90% of care home residents have had autumn boosters in Torfaen, Caerphilly and Blaenau Gwent. But this drops to less than a third in Pembrokeshire, so far.

Public health officials say different health boards are delivering the programme in different ways.

So far, overall figures show fewer getting jabs than in the earlier stages of the vaccination programme, which saw 98% of care home residents and 95% of the over-65s getting the first two doses, while more than 84% of care home residents had spring boosters.

The last week has seen the total jabs given since the Covid vaccination programmes started nearly two years ago pass the 8m mark, to 8,040,954.

Nearly all of these are autumn boosters, with an average running at 16,250 a day.

The target is that all those eligible will be offered a jab by the end of November.

But public health officials are concerned at missed appointments or people feeling they won't be able to rearrange because of other commitments and they are working to maximise uptake.

"We're very pleased with how it's going and we've seen in the last week more than 100,000 people who took the opportunity to get vaccinated," said Dr Chris Johnson, interim head of the vaccines preventable diseases programme at Public Health Wales.

"Last year, Covid was first and foremost in people's thinking but lives have been getting back to normal, which means people have other commitments. Meanwhile, Covid seems like it's gone away, but it hasn't."

Dr Johnson said it was "never too late" for people in the target groups to make or rearrange an appointment.

"It's concerning for anyone who hasn't got this protection. Even if you have had Covid or had a vaccination before, this is a safe and positive action to help prevent hospitalisation or serious illness."

Health officials still don't know exactly how flu, Covid and other respiratory illnesses will interact with each other this winter.

But they know flu is presenting itself, and is at the highest levels since 2019-2020, before the pandemic, even though it's currently still at low levels.

Figures on flu vaccinations are not expected before the end of the week but anecdotally, health officials are pleased with the uptake so far, in anticipation of a potential earlier flu season.