Following changes to the Human Medicines Regulations 2012, which came into force last week (October 16), pharmacists and other healthcare professionals who have experience in handling vaccinations will be trained to administer COVID-19 vaccines.
These changes also allow the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to “grant temporary authorisation, pending the granting of a licence, for new vaccines and treatments needed to tackle public health threats”. Read more about this here.
Suitably trained and competent pharmacists and technicians may be administering the COVID-19 vaccines. However, as the vaccines are currently unlicensed medicines, they cannot be administered under a Patient Group Directive (PGD). The government is considering expanding the scope of the PGD to allow the administration of unlicensed vaccines. In addition, healthcare professionals (HCPs) who do not normally administer vaccines may be eligible. Licensed or Temporarily authorised Covid-19 vaccines could be administered by pharmacy staff, but before you so, check how Brexit may affect the current EU consideration to provide blanket indemnity for all healthcare professionals delivering COVID-19 vaccination services
The need for a second dose of some of the vaccines and the extreme storage conditions required by some of the vaccines will challenge mass vaccination programmes. Four of the six vaccines in the UK portfolio require two doses, several weeks apart, with single and two-dose regimens being tested in trials of the other two vaccines.