THE VACCINATION programme was halted temporarily at the G Live vaccination station this week when it did not receive its supply.

The arts centre in Guildford had been shut since Monday (January 25), but appointments will run as normal from today (Thursday, January 28) as Surrey Heartlands Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) say they now have a ‘significant’ supply.

The venue was transformed into a vaccination station a fortnight ago, with plans to vaccinate more than 8,500 people a week from across the Surrey Heartlands area, including Haslemere.

Surrey Heartlands says it will not affect the number of people expected to be given the injection this week, and they are ‘working hard to meet the government’s target’ in three weeks time.

A spokesperson said: “There has been a change to the delivery slot for the local vaccination service at G Live in Guildford this week.

“The number of people who can be vaccinated is led by the supply of vaccine available.

“This change has not impacted the number of people we would have expected to vaccinate this week – the model has flexibility to allow for changes to delivery and the site can offer appointments 8am-8pm, seven days a week.”

She said all their other vaccination centres across the Surrey Heartlands area, including at Cranleigh Village Hall and at Superdrug in Guildford, had continued to run as normal.

Superdrug stores that give the jab, for example in Guildford High Street, are commissioned separately by NHS England.

The CCG spokesperson said they were ‘progressing well towards meeting the target of vaccinating the first four priority groups by mid February’.

The top four priority groups, considered most at risk from coronavirus, are residents in care homes and their carers; people over the age of 80 and frontline health workers; people over the age of 75; and people over the age of 70 and clinically extremely vulnerable people.

These have been decided on nationally, by the national Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI).

Surrey Heartlands, which covers about three quarters of the county’s population, was close at the end of last week to getting all the care homes’ clients and staff vaccinated, but had to reschedule some visits because of ‘outbreaks in a small number of homes’.

In their area over the six weeks up to the end of Sunday, January 17, 62,707 people received the first dose of their Covid-19 vaccination (34,528 aged 80 and over and 28,179 under-80s), according to National Immunisation Management Service data.

Farnham’s vaccination programme is being run separately by the town’s primary care network at Farnham Hospital, with support from the North East Hampshire and Farnham CCG.

About 230,000 people in Surrey are in the top four priority groups – this means if the target is met, nearly one in five of Surrey’s population would have received their first injection by February 15.

Surrey County Council leader Tim Oliver said he had confidence it could be done, "subject to getting hold of the vaccine", as he said 55,000 jabs a week could be given at full capacity.

He said: “That’s phase one and we need to hit that, but no one should be breathing a sigh of relief after that. We need to get on and vaccinate everybody else."

“It takes up to three weeks for the vaccine to be effective,” he added. “This vaccine is not a suit of armour.

“People must continue to behave sadly and abide by the social distancing rules, face coverings and washing their hands. They need to do that irrespective of whether they’ve had the vaccine or not.”