Evaluating the Geographical Accessibility and Equity of COVID-19 Vaccination Sites in England

Catherine Duffy,Joanna Górska,Andy Newing

doi:10.3390/vaccines10010050

Abstract

We assess the geographical accessibility of COVID-19 vaccination sites—including mass vaccination centers and community-level provision—in England utilizing open data from NHS England and detailed routing data from HERE Technologies. We aim to uncover inequity in vaccination site accessibility, highlighting small-area inequality hidden by coverage figures released by the NHS. Vaccination site accessibility measures are constructed at a neighborhood level using indicators of journey time by private and public transport. We identify inequity in vaccination-site accessibility at the neighborhood level, driven by region of residence, mode of transport (specifically availability of private transport), rural-urban geography and the availability of GP-led services. We find little evidence that accessibility to COVID-19 vaccination sites is related to underlying area-based deprivation. We highlight the importance of GP-led provision in maintaining access to vaccination services at a local level and reflect on this in the context of phase 3 of the COVID-19 vaccination programme (booster jabs) and other mass vaccination programmes.

Highlights

The UK became the first country to approve a COVID-19 vaccine, kick starting a nationwide programme of immunisation beginning on 8th December 2020 [1]
National Health Service (NHS) analysis summarized in Table 1 highlights their claims that 99.11% of the adult population in England lived within a straight-line distance of 10 miles of a vaccination site on 6 July 2021
Our analysis, using sophisticated routing data, suggests that 98.5% of eligible adults lived within a ‘drive distance’ of 10 miles from their nearest vaccination site, supporting the NHS’ headline coverage figures

Summary

Introduction

The UK became the first country to approve a COVID-19 vaccine, kick starting a nationwide programme of immunisation beginning on 8th December 2020 [1]. Highest priority cohorts were offered vaccinations in the period December 2020 to April 2021 (phase one, including all adults over the age of 49), with phase two (the remaining adult population) commencing in April 2021 [3]. This necessitated a network of over 2000 vaccination sites and required considerable service reorganisation within the NHS at a rapid and unprecedented scale. This paper considers one core aspect of the spatial organisation of the COVID-19 vaccination programme in England, assessing the provision of vaccination sites, capturing their geographical accessibility (the ease with which potential recipients can physically access those sites) It aims to uncover inequity in vaccination site accessibility at the neighborhood level. Analysis are based on the network of vaccination sites at the peak of phase 2 of the vaccination programme in July 2021, with recommendations made for the administration of ‘booster jabs’ (phase 3) and other routine or mass vaccination programmes

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