Charlton Athletic’s stadium will become a mass vaccination centre for one day on Saturday – with all Greenwich borough residents who have not yet had a jab invited to the drop-in session.
The first 1,000 people at The Valley between 8am and 8pm will get a free ticket for a future Charlton match, with other prizes on offer during the day.
While The Valley has been open to locals with appointments for jabs since March, Saturday will be the first time its gates have been flung open for all, with people set to queue up around the pitch to get their vaccine.
AstraZeneca vaccines will be on offer for those over 40; under-40s will also be able to get the jab but will need a clinical assessment first. People who have had their first vaccine eight weeks ago but not yet had their second are also invited. More details are on the Greenwich Council website.
While nearly 80 per cent of the UK population have had one at least one jab, that figure falls to 60 per cent in Greenwich. While London has a comparatively younger population, there is still some ground to be made up in older age groups – nearly a quarter of people aged 50 to 55 in Greenwich have still not had a jab, according to Public Health England data.
Pop-up clinics are taking place around the borough with other vaccines, often at short notice – today will see Pfizer jabs offered to over-25s at the Clockhouse community centre on the Woolwich Dockyard estate from 9am to 4.30pm.
Pfizer vaccines will also be offered at the Wallace health centre in Clarence Road, Deptford, on Wednesday; the Amal Pharmacy in Greenwich Millennium Village on Thursday and Sutcliffe Park Sports Centre in Eltham on Friday.
In addition, the Woolwich Late Night Pharmacy in General Gordon Square is offering AstraZeneca vaccines to over-40s every day from 8am to 2pm until July 25.
Regular listings of pop-up vaccination centres can be found on the NHS South East London website – which also includes neighbouring boroughs – and on Greenwich Council’s social media feeds.
In the past seven days, there have been 53.8 cases of coronavirus for every 100,000 Greenwich borough residents – a figure last seen in early February. This compares with 58.5 in Lewisham, 31.8 in Bexley and 49.9 in Bromley.
As the third wave of the virus takes hold, the worst-hit London boroughs are Lambeth (114.4) and Wandsworth (108.3).
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