Dear Colleague,

The national roll out of Covid-19 vaccines is now well underway for people who are most at risk. This current vaccination group includes some people who are over 80-years-old, people who live or work in care homes and health care workers at high risk.

We are proud to have attracted national headlines for having the first vaccines given outside a hospital last month at a GP clinic in Kennington, and when Martin Kenyon, 91, from Stockwell attracted international attention when he became one of the first people in the world to receive the Pfizer/BioNTech jab.

The vaccine has been rapidly developed and will save lives, reduce pressure on the hugely over-stretched NHS and progress towards having the strict restrictions we currently face loosened. Many of us have experienced illness and loss during this pandemic, and as an organisation we strongly back this vaccination campaign.

We are working with our colleagues across the public sector in support of the vaccination campaign which is being led by the NHS. The Government has ambitious targets for immunisation and in the coming weeks we expect that front-line council staff offering direct care to residents will be offered the vaccination.

We welcome this development and will be working hard to support this work.

We also appreciate that because this vaccine is so new our council staff, our residents and all our diverse communities will rightly have questions about the roll out, be seeking reassurance about the safety of the vaccines and want to find out more.

Our NHS partners from the South East London Clinical Commissioning Group (SEL CCG), who cover Lambeth, Bexley, Bromley, Greenwich, Lewisham and Southwark, are responsible for planning and paying for most health care services local people use. They have prepared a comprehensive set of question and answer pages online for us all to use to reassure ourselves, and our residents, regarding the vaccine:

https://selondonccg.nhs.uk/what-we-do/covid-19/covid-19-vaccine/#whocangetcovid19vaccine

This highlights that how the vaccine has been found to be safe and effective. It has been tested on tens of thousands of people in several countries and approved by many experts including the World Health Organisation. Vast numbers of volunteers have been involved in what is an unprecedented level of research and investment, meaning the timescales for development and approval of the vaccine have been much quicker than usual.

To support and reassure our diverse communities during this vaccination programme the council is working with SEL CCG and other community partners to hold public conversations, sharing information and giving people the chance to have their say. This is an incredibly important piece of work and as this progresses more information will be shared with staff.

Our Director of Public Health Ruth Hutt will be joining me for our next all staff online Q&A session on Thursday at 2.15pm when we will be discussing the vaccine and taking your questions about the roll out, the level of local infections and how we can all work together to get through this ongoing crisis.

Andrew Travers
Lambeth Council Chief Executive