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A community pharmacy in north Wales is set to be the first in the region to provide the COVID-19 vaccine.
Wales’ first community pharmacy will deliver the COVID-19 vaccine this week, before it is distributed to pharmacies “in every corner” of the country, said Welsh prime minister Mark Drakeford.
Speaking to the Welsh Assembly on the delivery of the COVID-19 vaccine, Drakeford said a community pharmacy in north Wales was the first in the region to provide a vaccine.
He said this was part of a “trial” before community pharmacy became more widely involved.
“It will be the first community pharmacy to deliver the vaccine [administering it] by the end of this week, and that will be in North Wales, ”said Drakeford, speaking on 12 January 2021.
“There are some practical things that need to be resolved, and you need to have a little chance of making sure everything is done in the best and safest way. ”
“We will test that with a community pharmacy in North Wales before the end of this week, and then we will want to use community pharmacists in all parts of Wales,” he continued.
The Welsh government has agreed legislation to allow community pharmacies, and other primary care providers, to enter into contracts with local health boards to provide the COVID-19 primary care vaccine scheme.
Drakeford said “all GP surgeries are in the Hywel Dda [health board] the area has signed up to deliver the vaccine and we also use community medicines. ”
Elen Jones, director of the Royal Society of Pharmacy (RPS) in Wales, said the RPS is “very supportive of using the skills of the community pharmacy department in the COVID-19 vaccination program”.
“We welcome the Welsh government’s approach as set out in the recently published vaccination strategy. We understand that a delivery model needs to be tested before community pharmacy communications can be rolled out across Wales, ”she said.
“This is a complex picture and we recognize that there will be particular challenges for community pharmacies and across all health board areas. It is important that arrangements are clear, effective and efficient, and that delivery models are implemented as soon as possible across Wales to support the emergency vaccination program. ”
Drakeford ‘s comments come as community pharmacy – led vaccination sites in England are also starting to provide vaccines during the week beginning 11 January 2021.
Boots has previously confirmed that it will run three vaccination centers in Halifax, West Yorkshire, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire and Gloucester, and Superdrug has announced that it will operate five vaccine sites “in the north and west. south of England ”.
Speaking to the BBC on 13 January 2021, Toby Anderson, chief executive of McKesson UK – LloydsPharmacy’s main company – said they had set up five vaccine sites, one of which has been approved by NHS England.
“We are working on submitting five more [sites for approval] the next day or so, bringing the number up to ten, ”he said, adding that he has been in talks with the government“ because we believe LloydsPharmacy – and a community pharmacy – can – do much more ”.
“The requirements have changed a bit – for example, just doing 500 jobs per site per week (and I’m talking about the AstraZeneca vaccine, which has different cooling requirements so it can be kept in larger sizes less) – means a company like Lloyds could make 150,000 vaccines a week from, say, 600 pharmacy locations across the country, ”Anderson explained.
Currently, NHS England requires all local vaccine sites run by community pharmacies to provide 1,000 vaccines each week.
Citation: The Journal of Medicine
DOI: 10.1211 / PJ.2021.20208739