Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to support (a) GP surgeries and (b) community pharmacies to meet increased demand for the winter flu vaccine.

NHS England and NHS Improvement are working with local areas to ensure that local providers have the support to meet increased demand for the flu vaccination this winter. New models of delivery have been shared with regional commissioning teams to encourage innovative thinking such as mobile, and mass vaccination models to allow for increases in uptake safely whilst observing social distancing and personal protective equipment requirements.

Alongside this, additional trained workforce is being made available to local providers to help them vaccinate more eligible people.

Additional flu vaccine has been purchased by the Department to ensure more flu vaccines are available this winter.