Winter flu vaccines could be crucial to stop the NHS being overwhelmed says Sheffield health expert

Director of Public Health Greg Fell says he expects a national push to encourage children, as well as elderly and vulnerable people, to have flu jabs.

Councillors said they were anxious about a second spike of Covid-19 combined with annual seasonal flu as it would burden the NHS.

Mr Fell said he expected nationally to see a bigger public health focus on flu than there had been for many years.

He told a meeting: "I suspect we will broaden the eligibility of flu jabs and try really hard to get vaccine coverage as high as possible, particularly for elderly and vulnerable people and children.

"Flu vaccinations are one of the key tools and we will push really hard on that. An aggressive campaign on hand washing also seems to be making a difference for all sorts of other respiratory infections."

Mr Fell said it was tricky to differentiate between Covid and flu symptoms as they are similar and said there were three possible scenarios.

"The first is that the virus goes away and there is precedent for coronaviruses to disappear but it's very unlikely and doesn't seem to be happening anywhere else in the world.

"The second is the virus could continue to be at tolerable levels but there's a surge in cases in winter.

"Or the third scenario is there's a significant spike timed with winter which would be trouble for the NHS and social care.

"I don't want to curtail the opening of Sheffield and we can't stay in lockdown forever so it's a very difficult balance with keeping people safe, protecting the vulnerable and reopening Sheffield.

"As we reopen there is more opportunity for the virus to spread. It's exceeding unlikely there will be a vaccine against Covid this calendar year and the bets are on the middle of next year.

"We need to keep our foot on the pedal and remind people that social distancing and hand washing are still necessary."

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