GP surgery teams, community staff, hospital vaccination teams, volunteers and community partners have come in for praise for their tireless efforts after a major COVID-19 vaccination milestone was reached in the county.

In total, over 100,000 people in the top priority groups have now received their first dose of COVID-19 vaccine in Gloucestershire and the county continues to pull out all the stops to help keep people safe.

The NHS is confident that, pending vaccine supply, it is on track to meet the target of vaccinating the first four priority groups by the middle of this month.

Clinical Chair of NHS Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group, Dr Andy Seymour said:

“It seems that every few days our remarkable vaccination teams hit another important COVID-19 vaccination milestone.

Behind each of these numbers is a person they are helping to protect. This remarkable effort should in time also help to relieve some of the intense pressure on the NHS and bring some normality back to everyday life.

Due to the amazing team effort right across Gloucestershire, we are making great progress in vaccinating the over 70s, including the housebound, very high risk patients, health and care staff and GPs have now provided vaccinations in every older people’s care home in the county.”

Gloucestershire is widely recognised as being at the forefront of the COVID-19 vaccination response.

The county’s NHS moved fast to set up the Edward Jenner Vaccination Hospital Hub and a network of 10 GP led community vaccination centres (and mobile services) across the county in December. This was against the backdrop of winter and COVID-19 related pressures and the need to maintain vital day to day medical care and services.

Additional staff and community vaccination services have also been established in recent weeks.

Professor Steve Hams, Chief Nurse at Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Senior Responsible Officer – Gloucestershire COVID-19 Vaccination programme said:

“These achievements and the continuing progress being made in the county is truly staggering and it’s great credit to all those involved – their hard work and selfless approach are making this all possible.

In addition to the fantastic achievements of our primary care network led community vaccination services, we were also able to celebrate the wonderful efforts of our hospital vaccination teams as we passed 20,000 health and care staff vaccinations.

As well as the health and care professionals who have been leading the vaccination programme, we would also like to pay tribute to the great many volunteers who are supporting the One Gloucestershire effort and making a big difference.

We know that people are thinking of family members and many people in the other top priority groups are keen to receive their first doses of the vaccine. Please wait for the NHS to contact you – we will get to you as quickly as possible.”