Toni Orloff: ‘The flow of patients is critical so there are no bottle necks’

HUNDREDS of Covid-19 vaccine doses were administered from Islington GP practices for the first time this week, in a feat that health chiefs have likened to “organising Glastonbury in a week”.

A GP-run “hub” at the Bingfield Primary Care Centre in Barnsbury was opened for the first time on Tuesday after a batch of 975 coronavirus vaccines arrived at the clinic.

This came less than a week after health chiefs in the borough were given the green light by government officials to prepare to start injecting the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine.

Mike Clowes, chief executive of the Islington GP Federation which helped organise the vaccine operation in the borough, said: “We’ve all been working non-stop. It’s been like organising Glastonbury in a week.”

A second hub has been set up at the Hanley Primary Care Centre in Finsbury Park where the first jabs will start being injected today (Friday).

The Pfizer BioNTech vaccine, which has been approved by regulators and has already been given to some NHS staff and over-80s in the UK, must be stored at -70 degrees celsius after it is shipped from Belgium.

The vials, which contain five doses, are then slowly “drawn” to fridge temperature at which point there is a window of just over three days for it to be delivered into patients.

Elderly patients in Islington were contacted last week.

Each patient was given a seven-minute slot where they would come to the surgery, enter a booth and receive the jab.

The waiting room in the Bingfield Street surgery was then used as a space where the patients could be monitored for 15 minutes in case they had an allergic reaction; a very rare occurrence so far.

Volunteers have been brought in to safely marshal the elderly patients in and out of the practices.

Toni Orloff, Islington GP Federation chief operating officer, said: “Every part of the team is critical. It’s like choreographing an orchestra, each section has to work at precisely the right time.

“The flow of patients is critical so there are no bottle necks.”

The UK has bought 40 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine. Each patient requires two doses about 21 days apart.

The Oxford Astra­Zeneca vaccine, which uses a different technology, is expected to come into use next year.

This vaccine does not need to be stored at such low temperatures and so it is expected that it could be much easier to deliver.

Those most vulnerable to the coronavirus are being offered the vaccine first.