Members only
NHS England is asking providers to plan for the Autumn/Winter 2024/25 flu and COVID-19 seasonal campaign on the same basis as last year.
Providers should expect the COVID-19 and adult flu vaccination programmes to commence in early October, as anticipated by the flu letter issued in March 2024.
The eligible cohorts are, from 1 September 2024:
- pregnant women
- all children aged 2 or 3 years on 31 August 2024
- primary school aged children (from Reception to Year 6)
- secondary school aged children (from Year 7 to Year 11)
- all children in clinical risk groups aged from 6 months to less than 18 years
From October 2024, exact start date to be confirmed by NHS England in due course:
- those aged 65 years and over
- those aged 18 years to under 65 years in clinical risk groups (as defined by the Green Book, Influenza Chapter 19)
- those in long-stay residential care homes
- carers in receipt of carer’s allowance, or those who are the main carer of an elderly or disabled person
- close contacts of immunocompromised individuals
- frontline workers in a social care setting without an employer led occupational health scheme including those working for a registered residential care or nursing home, registered domiciliary care providers, voluntary managed hospice providers and those that are employed by those who receive direct payments (personal budgets) or Personal Health budgets, such as Personal Assistants
For more, see letter from Steve Russell, Chief Delivery Officer and National Director for Vaccinations and Screening, NHS England, dated 30 May 2024 and annual flu letter dated 12 March 2024, as amended on 12 June 2024, which has more detail about how the campaign applies to frontline social care workers.
As in previous years, frontline staff, employed by specific social care providers without access to employer led occupational health schemes (see cohort eligibility above), can access the vaccine through the NHS free of charge.
