Following advice from JCVI ( Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation ) about who should be eligible for the Covid Booster this winter, Scottish Government has now confirmed that unpaid carers will not be on the list of groups who will be offered the vaccine.
The Covid booster will only be offered to the following groups this winter:
- living or working in a care home for older adults
- aged 65 and over
- aged 6 months and over with an eligible health condition
- pregnant
- a frontline health or social care worker
The National Carer Organisations wrote a joint letter to the Minister asking that this decision be reconsidered and to extend eligibility for the Covid booster to unpaid carers in Scotland. We received a response from Jenni Minto – Minister for Public Health who re-iterated that eligibility for the Covid vaccine would not be extended to unpaid carers this winter. You can read the response from the Minister in full here.
We know that many unpaid carers will be disappointed to hear this, particularly as the offer of a Covid Vaccine is being made available to frontline health and care staff in Scotland on the basis of ‘occupational health’
Along with colleagues at VOCAL, we will be writing to the First Minister to express our disappointment at this decision. We would welcome support from other carer organisations and carers. If you would like to see a copy of the letter and add your name to it, please contact Shubhanna Hussain (shubhanna@carersnet.org) before 5th October at 5pm.
