The coronavirus vaccines will only have a “marginal impact” on hospital numbers in winter, the UK’s four chief medical officers have warned.
In a letter written to colleagues, they said the health services are set to face a tough three months ahead.
The chief medical officer of England, Professor Chris Whitty; of Scotland, Dr Gregor Smith; of Wales, Dr Frank Atherton; and of Northern Ireland, Dr Michael McBride, all signed the letter.
After coronavirus restrictions were eased for five days over the Christmas period, the chief medical officers warned of the consequences gatherings could have on the number of new Covid-19 infections.
Three households will be allowed to meet from December 23 to December 27, the Government announced.
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
The four medical officers said festive gatherings were likely to put additional pressure on healthcare services, adding the NHS is set to face a challenging time.
The letter read: “Winter is always a challenging time for the NHS and wider health and social care service. This year will be especially hard due to Covid-19.
“Although the very welcome news about vaccines means that we can look forward to 2021 with greater optimism, vaccine deployment will have only a marginal impact in reducing numbers coming into the health service with Covid over the next three months.
“The actions and self-discipline of the whole population during lockdowns and other restrictions have helped reduce the peak and in most parts of the four nations hospital numbers are likely to fall over the next few weeks, but not everywhere.
(Image: Getty Images)
“The social mixing which occurs around Christmas may well put additional pressure on hospitals and general practice in the New Year and we need to be ready for that.”
The letter praised health workers for responding “magnificently” to the challenges of the pandemic and stressed the importance of continuing support for others within the profession.
But it added that it was “essential” that the next months were used to learn more about the virus to help inform treatments.
“We do not expect Covid to disappear even once full vaccination has occurred although it will be substantially less important as a cause of mortality and morbidity,” it said.
(Image: PA)
“It is therefore absolutely essential that we use the next months to learn as much as we can as we expect Covid to be less common in the future.
“This will allow us to have the best chance of a strong evidence base for managing it over the coming years.”
It comes after the first doses of a coronavirus vaccine developed by Pfizer arrived in the UK on Thursday, December 3.
The UK has been the first country in the world to approve a Covid-19 jab, paving the way for vaccination to begin next week.
Both Wales and Northern Ireland have confirmed the first recipients of the vaccine will get it on Tuesday morning.
Video Unavailable
GP surgeries have been told to be ready to start staffing Covid-19 vaccination centres by December 14.
In letter sent out across England’s primary care networks, NHS England and NHS Improvement warned the “scale and complexity” of the immunisation programme would make it “one of the greatest challenges the NHS has ever faced”.
It was signed by Dr Nikita Kanani, medical director for primary care at NHS England and NHS Improvement, and Ed Waller, director of primary care at the same institutions.
“It is crucial we start to activate local vaccination services to allow priority patient cohorts to start accessing the vaccine,” it said.
The vaccination sites must be ready to administer 975 doses of the vaccine to priority patients within three-and-a-half days of delivery on December 14.
Speed is of the essence with the vaccine, as it is usually stored at -70C and will only remain stable at fridge temperatures of between 2C-8C for a limited period of time.
There are 975 doses in each of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine packs, which has posed a logistical problem of how they can be broken up and distributed to other key sites such as care homes.
The first to receive the vaccine in the centres will be those aged 80 and over, as long as their other risk factors “clinical or otherwise” had been taken into account.
-- to www.mirror.co.uk
