Vaccination priority list to cater to “mitigating health inequalities”
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunology (JCVI) has recommended flexibility with the priority list for the COVID vaccine, stating that people experiencing health inequalities should be prioritised.
Following the amendment of guidance that ensured staff working with homeless people were treated as “frontline health and social care” staff, the public health body deciding on vaccination priorities, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunology (JCVI), has recommended flexibility from authorities, meaning that the vaccine allocation should give attention to mitigating health inequalities. The committee has identified people who are experiencing homelessness as a group who are affected by these inequalities, something that has been a priority message for Thames Reach for some time. This has already meant that some hostel residents have been offered vaccination.
Thames Reach welcome JCVI’s recognition that the people who use our services can be particularly vulnerable, as this opens the route to earlier vaccination for people who are particularly at risk because they live in hostels or other shared accommodation, as well as those who already meet the criteria due to their age or clinical vulnerability. In the meantime Thames Reach are maintaining the protocol of ensuring that as many people as possible are registered with their GP, in order to make sure they are offered the vaccine at the appropriate time for optimum safety for all.