Hackney’s health network is to prioritise the “considerably high” number of vulnerable people who have not come forward for their second jab.

According to the latest figures in City & Hackney, 17,000 people over the age of 60 or clinically extremely vulnerable are still unvaccinated, putting them at risk of serious illness, hospitalisation, and even death due to Covid.

Health workers in the borough are now focusing on making the jab “available, local and as visible as possible”, according to workstream director Siobhan Harper.

This will include reoffering all those in the top nine most vulnerable cohorts Pfizer rather than Oxford/AstraZeneca.

Briefing councillors, medics and voluntary sector partners at a recent local outbreak board, Harper said: “Our concerns at the moment on the number of people who have not come forward for their second dose, which is quite considerably high. This is a worry for us.

“There are obviously a multitude of reasons behind why that might be. Our approach has been to consider that as our remaining priority."

Harper also stressed that an “ongoing piece of work” continues to be progressing vaccinations for homeless people in the borough.

Figures from May 2021 in the City & Hackney Homeless Covid Vaccination report remain only partial, with Ridley Villas, Cape House and the British Red Cross day centre for destitute asylum seekers and undocumented migrants returning incomplete data.

However, figures from a range of other sites, capturing 511 people, are low, with 48.9 per cent having been vaccinated with at least one dose and just 28.8pc receiving a second.

Another area of focus for the health network is care home staff; 89.3 per cent of 290 local residents in both older and younger adult care homes have now been vaccinated with at least one dose. This compares to 47.2 per cent of 12,541 eligible staff, with just 14.5 per cent of this number vaccinated with a second dose.

Those aged 25 and over can now book their vaccination on the NHS portal or by calling 119. New appointments on the portal are updated regularly.

www.hackney.gov.uk/coronavirus-vaccine for more information on where to get vaccinated.