Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to their announcement on 24 July that the “most comprehensive flu programme in UK history will be rolled out this winter”, what steps they took to ensure that a supply of flu vaccines would be available; and what assessment they have made of the reported shortage of such vaccines for autumn 2020.

There is no national shortage of the flu vaccine. We have sufficient vaccine for up to 30 million people to be vaccinated in England this winter.

General practitioners and pharmacists are directly responsible for ordering flu vaccine from suppliers which are used to deliver the national flu programme to adults, with deliveries phased through the season.

In addition, the Department has procured additional doses of seasonal flu vaccine to ensure more flu vaccines are available from November.