As on Monday night (February 8), a total of 12,200 people living in Bexhill had received their vaccines, according to Dr Binodh C Bhaskaran, the clinical director of the Bexhill Primary Care Network which is responsible for the area’s vaccine rollout.
Those who have received their first jabs include the clinically vulnerable, the over-70s, care home residents and staff and housebound patients.
Dr Bhaskaran said he was confident that all residents within those top four categories would be offered their first dose by Friday – ahead of the government’s target of February 15.
They are then expected to start receiving their second doses in the middle of March, roughly 12 weeks after the first vaccines were administered in Bexhill on December 29, 2020. Some other parts of the country are due to start this process at the beginning of March after rolling out their first vaccines at the start of December.
In Bexhill, there are approximately 100 housebound residents awaiting their first jabs – 350 have already received theirs – which should be completed by the end of this week.
The remaining care home residents – less than five per cent – should all be vaccinated by Wednesday afternoon (February 10), Dr Bhaskaran said.
He added the primary care network – which is made up of the four GP practices in Bexhill – was administering 500 vaccines per day. This week, that would take the total of vaccines administered in Bexhill to more than 14,000. Dr Bhaskaran previously said there were roughly 15,000 Bexhill residents within the top four priority groups, but a small number have refused their first dose or could not receive it due to health concerns, while some others have received their vaccine in Brighton or Eastbourne.
All over-70s who have not yet received their first dose of the vaccine have been advised to contact their GP surgery.
Bexhill’s Covid-19 vaccine programme is being carried out at the Sidley Medical Practice and is administering jabs to all patients registered with Collington Surgery, Little Common Surgery, Pebsham Surgery; and Sidley Medical Practice.
Dr Bhaskaran said: “We are awaiting updates from the government but our plan is to start vaccinating the over-65s early next week.
“We will have a few weeks to vaccinate them before we start giving second doses to the most vulnerable residents in mid March.”
Dr Bhaskaran said he was confident that all over-50s in Bexhill would have been offered their first vaccine dose by May.