Latest news with #fluVaccine
Times
4 days ago
- General
- Times
The NHS has a vaccine problem: staff don't want the jab
Doctors, nurses and other frontline NHS staff are shunning the flu vaccine in ever-greater numbers, with almost nine in ten staff at one of England's largest hospital trusts unvaccinated last winter. Barts Health Trust, which has more than 18,750 staff working in six hospitals in east London, had the worst results in England, managing only 12.9 per cent, or 2,416, frontline staff getting vaccinated. This includes nurses and doctors working at the Royal London in Whitechapel, a major trauma centre treating some of the most seriously injured and sick patients in the capital. The dire take-up is symptomatic of a problem on NHS wards across England. New data shows the number of NHS staff getting the seasonal flu vaccine over winter has crashed to 37.5 per cent — its lowest level in almost 15 years. This year's drop of 5.3 percentage points is the fourth consecutive year that vaccination rates have fallen since the pandemic. The flu vaccine is essential to prevent widespread sickness in hospitals. A bad flu season can lead to tens of thousands of deaths, particularly in elderly patients and those already ill with other conditions. More than 22,500 excess deaths were linked to flu in the winter of 2017-18. An outbreak can also lead to staff shortages, cancelled operations and put patients at risk of being infected by staff who are meant to be caring for them. The rapid fall is another sign of the wider phenomenon of 'vaccine fatigue' that is being blamed for a rapid decline in vaccinations, including those designed to protect children from deadly diseases such as measles. The UK Health Security Agency said there was also complacency about the threat of some diseases and the agency was working to make sure parents were educated about the risks of not vaccinating their children. Last week, it emerged efforts to eradicate cervical cancer in England by 2040 were at risk of being derailed because of a crash of 17 percentage points in children getting vaccinated against human papillomavirus, or HPV. 'The number of NHS staff getting vaccinated is very low, it is worrying,' said Heidi Larson, a professor of anthropology and founding director of the Vaccine Confidence Project at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. It tracks public sentiment towards vaccines and has been running since 2010. • Pharmacies running out of flu vaccine as NHS restricts free jabs Larson said vaccine fatigue and wider falls in vaccination rates were being seen globally but particularly in Europe and western nations. 'It's a mix of things going on,' she said. Since the pandemic, people had reacted against a sense of being controlled and forced to have jabs. 'A lot of people were kind of bullied, almost, in a positive sense, to get the first Covid dose in the UK. It was very successful but there was this sense of control and people have said in our studies they resented taking that vaccine. Some people, maybe subconsciously, are angry about having been pushed into taking them. They feel enough is enough towards vaccines. What I see is a sort of societal PTSD and within that some people are now saying they won't get vaccinated as a reaction.' The pandemic had also made more people aware of vaccines and the science behind them and prompted more people to go online where, Larson said, they were confronted by 'toxic information'. Urgent action was needed to reverse the decline but she warned the NHS and government against a 'top-down command and control campaign', which could make matters worse. Instead, more nuanced conversations using peer influencers and community leaders were needed. According to the UK Health Security Agency's official statistics, released last month, 37.8 per cent of frontline health workers across hospitals and GP practices had a flu vaccination between September and February. This is the lowest since 2010-11 when 35 per cent of staff were vaccinated. • Treat the sickest and forget targets, Wes Streeting tells NHS GP surgeries managed more vaccinations — with 52 per cent of staff getting the jab — but this was down 10 per cent on the year before. Among staff groups, doctors were the most vaccinated but still achieved only 42 per cent. Only 38 per cent of nurses had the vaccine and the lowest level was among support staff, with 34 per cent. During the winter, almost 75 per cent of over-65s had a flu vaccine. The number of people with longer-term health conditions being vaccinated fell to 40 per cent. Similar falls were seen in primary school children and toddlers but coverage among secondary school children hit almost 45 per cent — the highest yet. More than 7,750 deaths were linked to flu in 2024-25, double the number the year before. London, as a region, had the lowest vaccination rate at 31 per cent but this was more than double the performance of Barts Health Trust. One senior consultant at Barts Health Trust, who had the jab, said they were shocked at the results and blamed apathy by some staff. They said: 'I had mine from a vaccine champion who visited different clinical areas to vaccinate staff.' Managers needed to do better, they said, adding: 'They should be spending summer finding out why staff didn't get it, rather than just doing the same again next winter.' Caroline Alexander, chief nurse at Barts, said: 'We understand that vaccine fatigue and hesitancy is a real concern for staff. While this challenge is not new and was heightened during the pandemic, we have been actively working to address it through a targeted communications campaign in collaboration with NHS England aimed at dispelling myths and building trust around vaccines.' She said the trust had offered mobile clinics and drop-in sessions in hospitals and sent trained vaccinators to wards and departments. Before next winter the trust would be highlighting the dangers of not having the flu vaccine. The best-performing trust was South East Coast Ambulance Trust, which managed a vaccination rate of 74 per cent. A spokesman there said it had a proactive campaign with vaccinators visiting workplaces with incentives such as 'free coffee for a jab'. It also used real-time data to track who had been jabbed to help target staff and teams with low uptake levels. Other problems include hesitancy by black and minority ethnic staff and communities towards vaccines. The NHS has also scrapped payments made to hospitals for encouraging more staff to have jabs. • Combined flu and Covid vaccine could be ready by this winter Those eligible for a free jab include all over-65s and any adult with specific risk factors such as diabetes. Pregnant women are also eligible along with schoolchildren and residents in care homes. The jabs are changed each year to reflect which viruses are dominant. This year the vaccine protected against four types of influenza. A vaccine cannot give you flu and is generally considered safe and effective. People can suffer mild reactions and side-effects but serious complications are extremely rare. The NHS has included messages on staff pay slips to try to increase vaccinations as well as working with medical colleges to design better messaging for staff groups. Sir Stephen Powis, the NHS England medical director, said: 'NHS trusts have a mandatory obligation under the NHS standard contract to make a flu vaccine offer to 100 per cent of their frontline staff every year.'
The Guardian
21-05-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Moderna withdraws application for US approval of combined flu-Covid shot
Moderna said on Wednesday it had withdrawn an application seeking approval for its flu and Covid combination vaccine candidate after discussions with the US Food and Drug Administration. The company said it would resubmit the application later this year with vaccine efficacy data from a late-stage trial of its experimental seasonal influenza vaccine, which it expects to report this summer. The decision comes a day after the US FDA said it would require new clinical trials for approval of annual Covid-19 boosters for healthy people under 65 years. Shares of the company have been battered by declining Covid revenue as well as investor concerns spurred by the appointment of the vaccine skeptic Robert F Kennedy Jr as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. The shares fell another 1.4% in premarket trading on Wednesday. The FDA is due to make a decision on Moderna's next-generation Covid-19 vaccine, which is a component of the combination flu-Covid shot, by the end of the month. Moderna has previously said it does not expect a delay in that decision. Moderna in early May pushed back the time frame for likely approval of its combination vaccine – meant to protect adults aged 50 and above against both Covid-19 and influenza – to 2026. The company has been banking on revenue from newer mRNA shots to make up for falling sales of its Covid vaccine and less-than-expected uptake of its respiratory syncytial virus vaccine, which sent its shares down nearly 60% last year.
Daily Mail
17-05-2025
- Health
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE Major infection warning as record number of NHS staff reject flu vaccine - uptake falls from nearly 80 to 37% in four years
Hospitals were crippled by flu outbreaks this winter after record numbers of frontline NHS workers shunned the jab, the Mail can reveal. Fewer than four in ten staff (37 per cent) received the vaccine, with rates plummeting to less than one in ten (8.8 per cent) in some areas. Patient groups described the level of uptake as 'shocking' and accused refuseniks of negligently fuelling sickness and putting vulnerable people at increased risk of death. The all-time low came as overwhelming demand for care forced over a dozen trusts to declare 'critical incidents' and Britain's top doctor warned of 'skyrocketing' cases of flu. Professor Sir Stephen Powis, the then national medical director of NHS England, urged patients to get the vaccine saying it could protect them and others from the virus. Speaking last December, he said: 'The flu vaccine is our best defence against winter viruses, and it also helps to reduce pressure on hospitals.' But new figures obtained by the Liberal Democrats and shared exclusively with the Mail show most NHS staff failed to follow their employer's own advice. The proportion of healthcare workers, such as doctors and nurses, receiving a flu vaccine over winter fell from 64 per cent in 2016/17, when data was first collected, to just 37 per cent this year. That is a record low and a fall of 26.7 percentage points. There has been a marked fall in vaccine uptake from the peak of 2020/21 where it hit 76 per cent. Previous plans to make the vaccine compulsory were dropped amid a backlash from critics, who claimed the medical intervention should be down to personal choice. But Dennis Reed, director of Silver Voices, which campaigns for elderly patients, said: 'The NHS should make having the flu jab a condition of employment for frontline staff unless an individual has medical grounds for exemption. 'The shockingly low rates of uptake show a certain arrogance - a total disregard for patient safety - and puts vulnerable people at increased risk of death. 'Most NHS staff who catch flu will probably be OK but the people they are caring for may not survive if they pass it to them. It's personal negligence. 'Hospitals will have fared better over winter if more staff had bothered to get a flu vaccine, which we know is effective.' The levels of flu vaccine uptake varied hugely between NHS Trusts, despite it being offered to frontline NHS staff for free nationwide. The lowest uptake in the country was at Camden and Islington NHS Trust, where just 8.8 per cent of all healthcare workers had received a jab. This was followed by Barnet, Enfield and Haringey Mental Health Trust on 9.5 per cent and then Central and North West London Trust on 15.5 per cent. In total, 62 of the 184 NHS Trusts which had reported data for this winter saw less than a third of their staff take-up the flu vaccine, according to research by the House of Commons Library for the Liberal Democrats. There have been some drastic falls in some NHS Trusts in the number of staff taking up the vaccine in recent years. In Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust, there was a fall of 60.5 percentage points in the proportion of staff who received the flu vaccine this winter compared with 2016/17, with just 15.7 per cent of staff now vaccinated. At Lewisham and Greenwich there was a 59.5 percentage point fall and at Birmingham Women and Children's Hospital it was 59.2 percentage points. Since 2016/17 the number of healthcare workers delivering direct patient care has grown by more than 350,000 to almost 950,000, a jump of 45 per cent. But despite this rise in headcount, the number of staff taking up the flu vaccine fell by 76,000 (15.3 per cent) over the same period, from 496,000 to 420,000. Flu patients occupied hospital beds for a record number of days this winter – over 315,000 compared with around 174,000 in 2023/24 and 211,000 in 2022/23. This contributed to bed occupancy rates hitting 96 per cent at points this year, while a 'safe' rate is considered to be 85 per cent. Helen Morgan, the Liberal Democrat's health and social care spokesperson, said: 'Many A&Es resembled a war-zone at times during the winter. 'People were waiting in intolerable pain, treated in corridors and dying in glorified cupboards. 'The system is broken from top to bottom, with hospitals unable to move people into the community because of a lack of care provision, leading to deadly backlogs in our hospitals. 'The surge in those staying in hospital because they had flu, leading to fewer beds for those coming into A&E was a major problem contributing to these awful scenes. 'That's why it is absolutely vital that the Government boosts vaccine uptake through a coordinated awareness campaign across the health service, ensuring that staff are properly supported as they continue to do life-saving work for our NHS.' An NHS England spokesperson said: 'We strongly urge all eligible frontline health and social care workers and other at-risk groups to come forward for vaccination as soon as the programme starts in Autumn. 'The NHS continues to make flu vaccination for frontline staff as accessible as possible backed by an enhanced campaign to encourage staff to protect themselves and their patients. 'Flu hospitalises thousands of people every winter, putting immense pressure on our health service at its busiest time. 'Having our dedicated staff protected and healthy is crucial to their health and wellbeing, to meet these demands and provide the care patients need. 'Our upcoming Urgent and Emergency Care plan will include targeted initiatives to boost vaccine uptake, with a focus on healthcare workers, those most vulnerable and children, recognising that vaccination remains our strongest defence against flu.'
South China Morning Post
08-05-2025
- Health
- South China Morning Post
Hong Kong scientists make breakthrough on needle-free flu jab offering more protection
Hong Kong scientists have made a breakthrough in developing a new flu vaccine that is needle-free and has the potential to induce a more robust immune response against various virus strains. Advertisement The University of Hong Kong's Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine said on Thursday it had developed two novel vaccine approaches, each with its own characteristics and advantages that were expected to be used to create a new flu jab in the future. Professor Leo Poon Lit-man, chair of public health virology, said the long-lasting protective effects of new vaccines may reduce the need to receive yearly jabs, with more research to be done to determine the exact frequency. 'On mice, the protection given by the vaccine was very satisfactory compared with other live-attenuated influenza vaccines and inactivated vaccines,' he said. 'We can also see that the mice had a great immune response against different types of influenza, including human and avian ones. We believe our vaccines are not required to be received every year.' Advertisement Live-attenuated vaccines use a weakened form of the virus that causes a disease. Because these vaccines are so similar to the natural infection that they help prevent, they create a strong and long-lasting immune response, according to health authorities.
South China Morning Post
08-05-2025
- Health
- South China Morning Post
Hong Kong scientists make breakthrough on flu vaccine offering more protection
Hong Kong scientists have made a breakthrough in developing a new flu vaccine that is needle-free and has the potential to induce a more robust immune response against various virus strains. Advertisement The University of Hong Kong's Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine said on Thursday it had developed two novel vaccine approaches, each with its own characteristics and advantages that were expected to be used to create a new flu jab in the future. Professor Leo Poon Lit-man, chair of public health virology, said the long-lasting protective effects of new vaccines may reduce the need to receive yearly jabs, with more research to be done to determine the exact frequency. 'On mice, the protection given by the vaccine was very satisfactory compared with other live-attenuated influenza vaccines and inactivated vaccines,' he said. 'We can also see that the mice had a great immune response against different types of influenza, including human and avian ones. We believe our vaccines are not required to be received every year.' Advertisement Live-attenuated vaccines use a weakened form of the virus that causes a disease. Because these vaccines are so similar to the natural infection that they help prevent, they create a strong and long-lasting immune response, according to health authorities.
