Windsor & Maidenhead residents urged to get jabbed as UK braces for winter

The government unveiled a Covid-19 response: autumn to winter plan for England, laying out strategies on how they will curb the spread of the virus as both Covid, and influenza will circulate fully at the same time.

Research shows someone infected with both viruses are more than twice as likely to die than a person with Covid alone.

Plan A will offer more than 40 million people, including the over 50s, young people with health conditions, and frontline health and social care workers, booster jabs.

Health Secretary Sajid Javid set out the Covid winter plans in Parliament (PA)

It also plans to offer 12 to 15-year-olds a single dose of the Covid vaccines and encourage people to get a free flu jab.

However, if this fails, plan B will make face coverings compulsory in some settings, ask people to work from home, and introduce vaccine passports.

Winter has always put pressure on the NHS with influenza mixed and the situation doesn’t help with Covid-19 still circulating.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, Cllr Stuart Carroll, lead member for health, urged the unvaccinated to get their shot and called for those eligible for a booster and flu jab to come forward when called to do so.

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He explained this winter is going to be “very challenging” and England is beginning to see Covid cases and hospitalisations rise but is “nowhere rapid and rampant” as seen last winter, mainly due to the vaccination programme, when the Kent variant was circulating.

Cllr Carroll, who is an epidemiologist and on the UK vaccine task force, said: “Vaccination remains our nuclear weapon, but we are now heading towards a winter period fighting on new fronts, fighting Covid-19 and influenza, so it’s really, really important that everybody comes forward and does their bit to get vaccinated.”

In terms of a localised winter plan for the Royal Borough, Cllr Carroll said the council is working with its public health team and NHS colleagues in devising a “very robust” strategy “heavily focusing” on the Covid and influenza vaccination programme.

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It also sets out public messaging and communications with parents and carers around broader public health, such as the likelihood of a “re-emergence” of underling respiratory conditions to ensure people have the right advice to know what to do in those circumstances.

Cllr Carroll also urged everyone to carry on following basic public health protocols, such as hand washing and wearing face coverings in appropriate settings.

He said: “The evidence is clear now that will impact the ability for the virus to transmit and infect.

“So, we shouldn’t underestimate those things just because we’re freer and we’re out and about more doesn’t mean we should stop sanitising our hands, wearing masks at appropriate places, and thinking about distance.”