More than half of Sunderland adults are now fully vaccinated with 300,000 jabs given

Vaccine figures were revealed to Sunderland’s Health and Wellbeing Scrutiny Committee this week (June 9).

According to the latest snapshot of data from NHS bosses, around 300,000 jabs have been administered, with 54% of adults in the city receiving both doses.

Dr Fadi Khalil, clinical vice-chair of NHS Sunderland Clinical Commissioning Group, said vaccine teams were on the “home run” but there was still a way to go to vaccinate all adults.

“Vaccinations are really safe and effective and it’s our best way out of this pandemic,” he said.

Councillors heard that vaccinations of both doses for cohorts 1-9, which includes everyone over the age of 50 and the ‘at-risk’ population, are expected to be completed in the next week.

In this first phase, around 127,000 people have already received a first dose and of this number, approximately 112,000 people have received a second dose.

Vaccines for the next three cohorts in ‘phase two,’ all those aged 49 and under, are also expected to be offered over the next couple of weeks.

Around 42,000 people in cohorts 10-12 have been vaccinated with a first dose and second dose figures are at around 12,000.

Dr Khalil told the meeting: “Our full total is almost 300,000 doses across the city both first and second doses and our vaccination rate is 74% for cohorts 1-12 at the moment.

“If you want some further figures, that means 54% of all the adult population have had the two doses.

“It’s good but it can be better bearing in mind this is the full adult population and we’re not there yet.”

Work is ongoing to increase vaccine take-up within hard-to-reach groups and deprived communities and to further promote the vaccine programme.

Due to precautionary guidance on the AstraZeneca vaccine, people under 40 with no underlying health conditions are also being offered a Pfizer vaccine as an alternative.

However, Dr Khalil stressed that the AstraZeneca jab is safe and effective and that complications are “very rare.”

He explained: “The risk of a [blood] clot is very rare and it is even more rare with the second dose of an AstraZeneca.

“So the message is, if you have had no serious side effects with the first dose, please go ahead with the second.

“There’s a lot of scaremongering and fearmongering out there, the vaccine is really very safe and very effective.

“And again emerging evidence is that it’s very effective against the Delta variant.”

Dr Khalil added: “We’re cautiously optimistic about the effect on the Delta variant but we cannot afford to be complacent, please encourage all residents to go ahead for their second dose.”

Over 50s have been invited to book their first jab through the NHS since March 17, but NHS England data shows in Sunderland, 1,807 people aged 50 and over had still to receive a first vaccination dose as of May 30 – two per cent of the age group.

Across England, four per cent of people aged 50 and over – 800,600 – had not been vaccinated as of May 30.

For more information on Sunderland’s vaccine programme, visit: www.sunderlandccg.nhs.uk

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