The CCA wrote to the Health and Social Care Committee setting out how community pharmacy can play an even greater role in delivering NHS vaccines. This followed the 11th February Committee hearing on vaccinations which heard from a range of experts, including a pharmacy representative.
The letter warns that without action, vaccine uptake rates could drop further leading to avoidable disease outbreaks with serious health consequences.
In the letter, the CCA called for:
- Commissioning to be undertaken by age cohort, rather than vaccination programme. This would allow pharmacies to offer additional vaccines opportunistically to eligible patients – without them needing to book a separate appointment with a GP.
- NHS England and Integrated Care Boards to clarify how ICBs will be expected to commission vaccination programmes from April 2027 onwards, when responsibility will be delegated to ICBs. The CCA has recommended taking learnings from the covid vaccination programme which benefited from a national framework, ensuring nationwide standards, with flexibility for specific enhancements based on local need.
- Early communication with the community pharmacy sector when vaccination programmes change or are launched, given pharmacies need time to scale up resources, and to invest in IT, premises and personnel. For example, despite pharmacies set to be involved in a HPV catch-up campaign from this year, the sector has yet to receive any further details of how the programme will be undertaken.