Guidance for parents regarding the COVID-19 vaccination programme for 12-15 year olds

If you have decided to withdraw consent for your child to receive a vaccination you MUST send a letter with your child addressed to the immunisation team to his/her school on the day of vaccination, as due to the very high volume of calls/emails without a letter on the day we cannot guarantee the information will be forwarded to the immunisation team. Can you please provide us with your child’s full name, DOB, school they attend and the vaccine you wish to change your consent status for.  

We are receiving lots of parent queries surrounding the roll out of the COVID-19 single dose vaccine for children and young people aged 12-15. If you do not wish for your child to be vaccinated this is your choice, the best way to notify us of this is to complete a consent form and select the decline option – this also allows you to state your reason for decline.  

We are unable to answer all individual queries. See below for signposting:  

You can find further information regarding the COVID-19 vaccine from the following resources:

• ​A full list of information resources for eligible children and young people about the COVID-19 vaccination  (publishing.service.gov.uk) this page includes links to leaflets in different languages.
• Side effects and vaccine contents – a summary of product characteristics (medicines.org.uk)
• Co-administration – If we have consent for both flu and COVID-19 and are able to offer both within the same session we will aim to co-administer. See page 24 for further guidance: Greenbook COVID-19 chapter 14a (publishing.service.gov.uk)  ​

JCVI guidance changed on this in November 2021 for healthy 12-15 year olds.  It was previously a 4 week gap between testing positive for COVID-19 and having a COVID-19 vaccine and has now been extended to 12 weeks.  For those children and young people aged 12-15 years who are in the clinically vulnerable group or live in the same household with someone who is immuno-compromised, the 4-week gap still applies as it does with adults. If your child does not fall in to the immuno-compromised group, we are unable to administer the COVID-19 vaccine until 12 weeks has passed.  If you would like your child to be vaccinated please still complete the consent form and ensure you tick yes next to ‘my child has tested positive to COVID-19 in the last 12 weeks’ this will flag up to the lead nurse and they will advise on when your child can be offered vaccination. This may be in an out of school clinic. Universal vaccination of children and young people aged 12 to 15 years against COVID-19 – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

The electronic consent form can be completed on any device ie tablet, smart phone, laptop. All electronic consent form portals are closed at 12 noon two working days before the planned session. This is to ensure there is enough time for the nursing staff to triage all forms in order to allow for safe vaccination. If you have missed the deadline we are unable to take any consent until after the session is completed, this means your child will not be vaccinated at the planned school session. If you miss the deadline for your child to receive the vaccination in school, you are now able to arrange  a COVID-19 vaccination through pre-bookable appointments on the national booking system NHS National Booking System or by calling 119 free.

Parents of any child who was absent, unwell or who did not complete a consent form in time can use the national online booking system to book a slot for their child at their local COVID-19 vaccination centre. Parents of children in year 7 can also use the national system to book a vaccination at a local centre provided that their child has already turned 12.

In addition to our ongoing schools immunisations programme to provide COVID-19 vaccinations for 12-15 year olds, parents can use the national online booking system to book a slot for their child at their local COVID-19 vaccination centre, providing their child is 12 years old or above. Find out more from Book or manage a coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccination – NHS (www.nhs.uk)

The following local pharmacies are also providing COVID-19 vaccinations for 12-15 year olds:

Yes. When vaccinating a child for both flu and COVID-19 we administer the nasal or IM flu vaccine first and then the IM COVID-19 vaccine. However, we do not currently have any plans to co-administer any of the other school-aged immunisations with the COVID-19 vaccine due to operational capacity reasons.

Before we vaccinate any child we review them and check that it is safe to vaccinate on that day. If we have assessed that it is not suitable to vaccinate on that day the school will contact you and explain why. We will inform you of how the catch up programme will work at a later date. In bigger schools we sometimes are not able to vaccinate all the children on the same day due to capacity. In this case we will book a second vaccination session as soon as possible