Pharmacies told to load spring Covid slots

Pharmacies have been advised to load appointments from today (7 April) for the 2026 spring Covid vaccination programme, which will begin on Monday 13 April.

Community Pharmacy England (CPE) has said pharmacies should load their intended appointments in advance so the public could book available slots as soon as the National Booking Service (NBS) opened.

NHS England authorised the patient group direction (PGD) for delivering Covid vaccines to eligible people aged five and over last month.

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It came just over a week before the legislation enabling the development of National Protocols for delivering Covid vaccines ended on 31 March 2026.

The government has consulted on the introduction of a new, similar legal mechanism for the administration of vaccines – the Vaccine Group Direction – which is intended to continue to enable suitably trained pharmacy staff to participate in the programme.

On 1 April, the government also published the new Vaccine Group Direction for delivering Covid vaccines to eligible people from the age of five. This allows vaccine preparation, administration and record keeping to be delegated to suitably trained and competent practitioners under supervision where necessary.

There are no changes to the eligible cohorts for the 2026/27 season compared to last season. They include:

• Adults aged 75 years and over;
• Residents in a care home for older adults;
• Individuals aged 6 months and over who are immunosuppressed.

Pharmacy owners participating in the spring Covid vaccination programme will need access to the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP) to order Covid vaccines.

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This comes as a new Covid variant, BA.3.2, is predicted to become the dominant variant in the UK, according to Professor Ravi Gupta, a leading microbiologist at Cambridge University who is analysing the new strain.

Descended from the omicron variant, BA.3.2 is nicknamed the cicada variant and was first detected in South Africa in 2024. As of 11 February, cicada had spread to 23 countries and had been detected in the wastewater systems of 29 states in the USA.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that from November 2025 to January 2026, weekly BA.3.2 detections increased to about 30% of sequences in Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands.

Prof Gupta said:  ‘It has been found in the UK, has been increasing in prevalence and I would expect it to become the dominant strain. BA.3.2 is undergoing testing right now.’

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While there are no signs that BA.3.2 causes more severe disease than other Covid variants, scientists have expressed concern that current COVID-19 vaccines may be less effective because it has developed a significant number of mutations.

Nevertheless, experts emphasise that vaccination still offers significant protection against severe disease.