Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Covid

Mumsnet doesn't verify the qualifications of users. If you have medical concerns, please consult a healthcare professional.

Original poster

Why the delay in England to vaccinate 18 - 30 year olds

33 replies

lightlowlight · 31/05/2021 07:39

Wales, Northern Ireland and now Scotland are inviting all over 18s for vaccination. In England we have this tedious system of moving down from 40 to 18 in two year blocks. So I guess 28-30 will be invited next, and then X days later it will be 26-28 year olds. Is this logistically the best way to maximise filling slots, or do we have more of a shortage of vaccines so they are managing it in this way to drag out the process without that being evident?

OP posts:
Waxonwaxoff0 · 31/05/2021 07:41

They're doing 30 now, I'm 30 and had my first on Saturday. Wales, NI and Scotland have much smaller populations than England.

DrMadelineMaxwell · 31/05/2021 07:42

Wales says it is, yes. But I cant get an appointment for my daughter at the local vaccination hub for her as they sont have anybsipply of pfizer due any time soon. I could have my pick of appointments if she could have the AZ.

nether · 31/05/2021 07:42

It's to keep the deluge of new attenders in slightly more manageable form.

But also I think there might still be supply issues.

My teen DC was approved on medical grounds back in early April, but we were told then we might have to wait until Pfizer supplies even out after some April hiatuses.

Here we are, nearly at the end of May without a sniff of an appointment

SoMuchForSummerLove · 31/05/2021 07:44

Scotland are offering it in hotspots only, across Scotland as a whole people that age are only being asked to register online to receive their appointment details by text.

MonsterMash2210 · 31/05/2021 07:45

They got through inviting the 30-39 year olds quite quickly in comparison to other age groups.

I don’t think (at their current page) 18-29 year olds will have that much longer to wait booking their jabs.

I think they are mainly staggering it the way they are to stop the website being overwhelmed.

I am in the 30-39 year old age bracket, had my jab on Saturday. Pretty much everyone I know had had 2 jabs.

I am the only person I know who had to join a queuing system to book their jab.

MonsterMash2210 · 31/05/2021 07:46

Also, supply issues (as other have stated) also have to be taken into consideration.

AllThatFancyPaintsAsFair · 31/05/2021 07:47

The system seems to have worked very well to date, why would they change it now?

Initially I thought they should have done it by occupation but I was wrong. Using a straight forward system of blocks by date of birth once the vunerable were done is the best way.

No idea about vaccine supply issues

LeafBeetle · 31/05/2021 07:47

I think it's because they're trying to bring forward the second dose for older people - I've just moved mine forwards by three weeks.

In terms of preventing deaths and hospital admissions, it makes more sense to focus on giving more of the over 30s their second jabs rather than giving the under 30s their first one.

dementedpixie · 31/05/2021 07:47

@lightlowlight

Wales, Northern Ireland and now Scotland are inviting all over 18s for vaccination. In England we have this tedious system of moving down from 40 to 18 in two year blocks. So I guess 28-30 will be invited next, and then X days later it will be 26-28 year olds. Is this logistically the best way to maximise filling slots, or do we have more of a shortage of vaccines so they are managing it in this way to drag out the process without that being evident?
Scotland is only inviting them to register at the moment. I'm 47 and only got my first one 2 weeks ago. We are further behind England age group wise so don't envy us
Notthisnotthat · 31/05/2021 07:49

My area of Scotland is only now vaccinating those in their 30s, we aren't in a hotspot area so some of our supply has been diverted to Glasgow, East Renfrewshire etc where numbers of cases are rising.

Wigeon · 31/05/2021 07:49

@nether

It's to keep the deluge of new attenders in slightly more manageable form.

But also I think there might still be supply issues.

My teen DC was approved on medical grounds back in early April, but we were told then we might have to wait until Pfizer supplies even out after some April hiatuses.

Here we are, nearly at the end of May without a sniff of an appointment

@nether - so presumably your DC is in cohort 6, the one with people with health conditions? I’d definitely chase your GP up about that - they should have had an appointment weeks ago as we are now on cohort 11, and the cohorts are being done in order. Every site has had plenty of Pfizer by now - you definitely shouldn’t have had to wait this long.
LeafBeetle · 31/05/2021 07:49

Also I think the reason for the 2-year blocks is that when they opened up slots for all 45-50 year olds at the same time, the system crashed with too many people logging on!

Wigeon · 31/05/2021 07:51

In answer to the OP - it’s a vaccine supply thing. I also wonder if Wales/Scotland/ N Ireland are opening the next cohort when the previous one is, say, only at 50% uptake, when England is waiting for, say, 75% uptake. So the devolved nations’ cohorts are more overlapping.

nordica · 31/05/2021 07:55

All the nations get an equal amount of supply (in proportion to their population numbers) so Wales having a smaller population doesn't matter.

There's someone called PaulMainwood on Twitter who has been tracking supply and targets, really interesting stuff. England has been holding a much bigger stockpile all along, for some reason.

Some GP led vaccination sites also stopped offering appointments for first doses here after they got through the 50+ groups so that's probably slowing things down too.

srghcx · 31/05/2021 07:57

Some places in England are doing 18 and above in hotspot areas. Even going down by 2 years at a time I've had to queue a few times when using the nation booking system. I imagine if they opened it to even bigger age ranges it would just crash, and that wouldn't help anyone.

nether · 31/05/2021 07:59

@nether - so presumably your DC is in cohort 6, the one with people with health conditions? I’d definitely chase your GP up about that - they should have had an appointment weeks ago as we are now on cohort 11, and the cohorts are being done in order. Every site has had plenty of Pfizer by now - you definitely shouldn’t have had to wait this long

Yes, that's my job for next week - I've rung once already, tested last week, and will both email and call tomorrow.

They feed to one hub, and haven't done whatever needs to be done to allow booking on national site on Pfizer pathway.

It's been remarkably stressful - the idea was (with the change of policy on 29 March putting immediate household of most vulnerable - ie CEV who are immune compromised - into cat 6) that the biggest risk was teen DC bringing something home from school

Jab approved before start of term. Half term and still not had it.

It's been really, really shit living with CEV person during this. But we've done it with quite good cheer. I could really cry about this one though. It would make such a difference, and I'm really stressed about how hard this has been.

Missypuff30 · 31/05/2021 08:22

@srghcx

Some places in England are doing 18 and above in hotspot areas. Even going down by 2 years at a time I've had to queue a few times when using the nation booking system. I imagine if they opened it to even bigger age ranges it would just crash, and that wouldn't help anyone.
@srghcx yes I've spotted there's walk in vaccinations for 18+ in areas on Birmingham.
3cats4poniesandababy · 31/05/2021 08:28

I think it is just how they are allocating their supply. For example I wonder if percentage of 35-40 year old is higher in England as they didn't spread the supply across such a large range.

Also if England's system is working for England why change it just because someone else did something different. End result should be the same.

cptartapp · 31/05/2021 08:35

My 18 year old has just been invited to book.
NW.

DrMadelineMaxwell · 31/05/2021 08:51

It is very much down to how it is distributed. Wales was proudly boasting about higher vaccination rates than other countries but it is very lumpy. When they said they had done 60% of
40-49s in Wales, my county had done a measly 7%.

Geamhradh · 31/05/2021 09:29

Good news.
I'm in Italy and in my region our final year school students could go yesterday (they have exams mid-June) and from 3/6 you can book with no age restrictions. DD (17) says she's staying up for fastest finger on the buzzer moment.

x2boys · 31/05/2021 09:39

They were offering it to anyone over the age of 18 in Bolton.

SoMuchForSummerLove · 31/05/2021 09:58

This is how the nations compare to each other as of yesterday. Wales has really streaked ahead lately, but there's little to choose between Scotland and England. I think it's often more of a perception thing than the reality.

Why the delay in England to vaccinate 18 - 30 year olds
knittingaddict · 31/05/2021 10:07

I imagine it's at least in part a way to manage bookings and not overwhelm websites. After all the populations of Wales and Scotland are considerably smaller than that of England.

hellsbells99 · 31/05/2021 21:59

I think it depends on areas. DD says 24/25 year olds being invited in Derby