More than half of all young teenagers in Scotland have had their first dose of the Covid-19 jab compared to just one in five in England.
In Scotland, young people aged 12 to 15 have been able to be vaccinated from September 20.
Public Health Scotland confirmed that 117,627 young people from the age group had received their first dose of the vaccine, equivalent to 50.2 per cent.
The take up in the age group has been faster than any other under the age of 65.
However, across the UK progress has been slower with the latest figures for England showing that just 18.9 per cent of 12-15 year-olds have received a dose of the vaccine.
Linda Bauld, professor of Public Health at the University of Edinburgh, says it comes down to convenience, not hesitancy.
Speaking to Sky News she said: “Is there more hesitancy in England? There’s no evidence at all to support that, it’s simply that we decided to arrange the system differently and I think that we were fortunate that that decision ended up to be the right one.
“I was at a vaccine clinic yesterday and there were many young people I assume in that age group just dropping in.
“So the convenience of not having a letter necessarily sent to the parents, of course we want parents and carers to discuss it with children, and of course in the vast majority of cases they are accompanying them to the vaccine centre, but young people can just drop in.
“A couple of our more rural health boards they’ve still been doing it in schools or with appointments but I think the convenience, we reached 50 per cent just yesterday, is the biggest driver.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel