Coronavirus: Vaccination

(asked on 7th December 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation: advice on priority groups for COVID-19 vaccination, published on 2 December 2020, whether the effect on the families of clinically extremely vulnerable patients has been included in the modelling determining the priority level of that group of people to receive the vaccine.


Answered by
Jo Churchill Portrait
Jo Churchill
Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This question was answered on 29th April 2021

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) reviewed evidence, including from OpenSAFELY, QCOVID, and mathematical modelling from the University of Warwick, when determining the priority groups for COVID-19 vaccine. Current evidence indicates that the single greatest risk for mortality from COVID-19 is increasing age and that the risk increases rapidly with age. The modelling work by Warwick University is available at the following link: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.09.22.20194183v2 Many of those who are clinically extremely vulnerable are in the oldest age groups and will be among the first to receive the vaccine. The JCVI recognises that individuals considered extremely clinically vulnerable have been shielding for much of the pandemic and this meant that available data are likely to underestimate the risk in this group. Considering data from the first wave of COVID-19 in the United Kingdom, the overall risk of mortality for clinically extremely vulnerable younger adults was estimated to be roughly the same as the risk to persons aged 70–74 years old. The prioritisation is based on the absolute risk of mortality, which evidence indicates is higher in those over 75 years of age, than in those considered clinically extremely vulnerable. The capacity of clinically extremely vulnerable patients to shield and the effect on the families of clinically extremely vulnerable patients were not included in the mathematical modelling considered by the JCVI. This was however considered in the decision to prioritise clinically extremely vulnerable individuals alongside those aged 70-74 years of age. Clinically extremely vulnerable individuals are in the third priority group for vaccination, as advised by the JCVI.

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