Professor Mike Holmes, who coordinates York's Covid vaccination centre, says in his weekly column for The Press that almost 2,000 people have come for their fourth vaccination - and more must follow their lead.

"Last week saw the beginning of another stage in the country’s vaccination programme as we started our Spring booster campaign.

We were pleased to see people booking in of their boosters again and almost 2,000 people made their way to Askham Bar for their fourth vaccination last week which is really encouraging. I can’t emphasise enough how important it is for people to respond to their invitation and keep up with their vaccinations. The NHS has run the largest and most successful vaccination service in the world and we’re continuing to protect people from serious illness.

Nimbuscare continues to keep our residents protected, doing our bit with a consistently high quality service. But we need you to do your part and make the trip to the vaccination centre. People will see a big difference to the site as we continue to develop it. We’re really proud of our new building and have already moved a few of our services into one area. Our new office building is also taking shape.

Inside the new temporary modular building we are holding health checks for people over

40. The NHS health check is a check-up for adults aged 40 to 74, designed to spot the early signs of stroke, kidney disease, heart disease diabetes or dementia. As we get older, we have a higher risk of developing one of these and our teams can help you manage these risks. So if you receive your invite to attend for your NHS health check, come down to Askham Bar and we will welcome you.

We’re looking forward to running a host of new services in such a way, on behalf of our member GP practices. By running some services jointly, on behalf of all 11 GP practices, we can work more efficiently and free up time for GP practices to focus on other patient needs. We believe this is the way forward for community healthcare and will help general practice be more sustainable.

We’ve also been looking back at the last year or so, here at Nimbuscare. It’s always encouraging to reflect on the progress that has been made:

•Our Long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) service, delivered across all 11 GP Practices, has supported 3,300 patients. Nimbuscare has 38 healthcare practitioners from across the 11 practices trained and qualified to complete these procedures.

•Our York Children’s Treatment Hub, based at Askham Bar, has cared for 300 children under the age of 11 so far, saving unnecessary visits to hospital for these families.

•Our Single Point of Contact hub has made contact with and supported over 12,000 patients with Covid or Long Covid.

•Our Improving Access service has created weekend and evening appointments for thousands of patients at GP practice hubs across York

•We have delivered almost 600,000 covid vaccinations, and 30,000 flu vaccinations since October 2020

•90% of our 18-80 year olds in York are Fully Vaccinated against Covid-19

•We delivered 45,000 covid boosters in the two week run up to Christmas 2021/22

•We delivered more than 80 outreach pop-up clinics which gave more than 25,000 vaccinations at York Universities, Homeless Shelters, City Streets, Churches, School Halls.

•We made 58 visits to secondary schools across north Yorkshire for 12-15 years programme

•We went out and did more than 25,000 care home, sheltered housing and housebound Flu and Covid vaccinations

•We held 12 bespoke antenatal vaccination clinics to support uptake in pregnant women as well as a number of bespoke vaccination clinics to support patients with learning disabilities.

So many part of the health and social care family have contributed to this and of course done so much more besides. As a city we should be proud of this. Of course there is so much more to do as we continue to deal with the pandemic and tackle our recovery from it. It will be the same staff that got you through the pandemic that will hep you recover from it…spare a thought for them, they are nothing less than incredible.