Vaccine targets ‘challenging but doable’ – BMA Chair

The Chair of the British Medical Association (BMA) in Wales has called Wales’ vaccine targets ‘challenging’ but ‘doable’ – if issues with supply are resolved.

Dr David Bailey, who is also the senior partner at Ty Bryn Surgery in Trethomas, said it is vital the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is supplied as quickly as possible, calling any delay to vaccinations ‘senseless’.

On Monday, January 18, First Minister Mark Drakeford caused controversy when he said doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine “have to last us until the beginning of February”, leading to suggestions the Welsh Government was delaying its rollout.

However, the Welsh Government moved quickly to confirm it “is not holding back any vaccines”.

Speaking to Caerphilly Observer, Dr Bailey said supply of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine has been a major obstacle in vaccinating as many people as possible.

He said: “The vaccines given out to practices is getting jabbed into people’s arms within a couple of days, but we are getting quite small amounts at the moment.

“A number of practices, including mine (Ty Bryn), have had their allocations of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines cut back from 300 to 200, and that seems to be a UK wide issue with supply.

“We are administering the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine as quickly as possible and we are perfectly comfortable doing that in GP practices.

“We are all keen to ramp up the numbers significantly because at the current rate it would take the rest of the year to vaccinate everybody.”

Welsh Government has set a target of vaccinating all nine priority groups by spring. To do so, Wales will need to vaccinate around 140,000 people per week.

As of Tuesday, January 19, 161,932 people in Wales had received their first vaccine, an increase of 10,195 from the previous day’s figures.

Around 5.1% of the Welsh population has currently been vaccinated – a similar rate for first doses of vaccinations in Scotland.

Wales still lags behind the rate of vaccination in both England (6.5%) and Northern Ireland (7%), however.

The number of Oxford Astra-Zeneca vaccines available in Wales is expected to increase rapidly in February as production is increased.

Dr Bailey added: “It all comes down to the supply of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine – which is the way forward for mass vaccination due to how easy it is to administer.

“Once issues of supply are resolved, I think the government’s targets can be achieved.

“We certainly need to see an upswell of vaccines coming into Wales, and when we do, GP practices can up their game significantly in terms of numbers, even if it means closing certain clinics to do that.

“GP practices are up for that because like our patients, we want to get vulnerable people vaccinated as quickly as possible.

“In the meantime, however, we have to get the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines into people as soon as possible and there is no excuse for delaying it.

“It is vital we continue to vaccinate all patient-facing health staff as quickly as possible.”