Cornwall has been revealed to be on the best performing areas in the country for delivering the covid vaccine.

The rollout of the vaccine continues apace in Cornwall with a second mass vaccination centre opening at the Royal Cornwall Showground in Wadebridge yesterday.

It joined another mass centre at Stithians Showground as well as vaccination centres in 13 other locations across Cornwall and two in pharmacies in Roche and Truro.

Today the governing body meeting of NHS Kernow heard that the rollout had been one of the best in the country.

Helen Charlesworth-May, chief officer of NHS Kernow, said:

"I am really pleased to say that the volume of vaccines that have been delivered in Cornwall is on a par with the best in the south-west and nationally which is a really, really positive thing.

"A significant number of our older population and in care homes have now been vaccinated."

Mrs Charlesworth-May said that vaccinations would continue with the first top four cohorts of priority patients and that planning was being made for the rollout to those in cohorts five and six.

These include those over 70 and those over 65 or with serious underlying health conditions between 18 and 65.

Mrs Charlesworth-May said that getting the vaccine to those groups would be "very very significant".

She said:

"We are really hopeful that as long as we get sufficient vaccines we will be in a place where over the next two months we will make significant progress against those two cohorts."

Natalie Jones, chief nursing officer for NHS Kernow, said that the first four priority groups should receive their vaccines by February 14 and that vaccines would be offered to cohorts five and six from February 15.

She said that staff from the primary care network in Cornwall had been able to visit every single care home in Cornwall, although some would have to be revisited as they were experiencing outbreaks at the time.

GP Dr John Garman asked whether there would be more notice given for when vaccines were being delivered to help with planning.

He said that there had been an extra 1,000 doses delivered in Helston and said that while they "managed to get them into people's arms" he said that it would be easier to plan if surgeries knew how many they were getting and when.

Natalie said that the vaccines had been distributed using a "push" method of sending them out when available but said that there were plans for the next cohorts to use a "pull" method where centres could order how many vaccines they need.

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