Fears of vulnerable patients contracting the coronavirus in GP surgeries as they queue to get the winter flu jab has led to calls for health professionals to go out to the homes of those most at risk from the virus.
In a letter to the Executive Office at Stormont this week, tech business leader Danny Moore, who set up the Robin Hood Appeal during the initial Covid surge to provide rapid assistance to frontline healthcare workers, said the current health campaign to bring the elderly to GP surgeries for the flu jab was potentially exposing them to the virus.
"Those who are in most urgent need of the flu vaccine are also those most in danger from Covid-19 — cancer survivors, the infirm over70s, those with underlying conditions, those who are shielding — and the last thing we should be doing is bringing them into a busy environment where people who are sick and staff who are in constant contact with the sick are gathering," the Options CEO told belfastmedia.com.
"If you look at the number of old age pensioners and those who are shielding who are being asked to visit busy GP surgeries, the potential of Covid contraction is worrying. If you do the math, the potential death toll is much bigger than the care home outbreak in the spring. I read that around 600,000 people in NI have got the flu vaccine in the last few weeks, if even 5 per cent of them get infected with Covid in the process, where would that leave us."
In a letter to the First and deputy First Minister, Danny Moore proposes a different approach to the flu vaccine campaign. "A creative approach might be to provide the flu vaccine to OAPs and those at risk either outdoors at the GP's surgery or, even better, outside at home."
Given that there is less chance of contracting the virus outdoors, he says this approach could be emulated when the Covid-19 vaccine finally arrives.
And this latter-day medical flying columns could be made up of nurses, pharmacists and doctors, says Danny.
"The key goal in the time ahead is to keep the vulnerable safe and if that means keeping our elders and infirm in their homes, it shouldn't be beyond us to launch the biggest-ever programme of vaccine delivery at home."
One local GP clinic has already taken steps to reduce the risk to elderly and at-risk patients by administering the flu jab in the hallway entrance of its Andersonstown Road surgery.
Patients arriving at the surgery of local GP Joe Duggan were met by healthcare professionals, kitted out in appropriate PPE, who were giving the flu jab in the hallway of the premises thus removing the need for the patient to enter the surgery proper.
