The COVID-19 pandemic has meant the worldwide demand for the seasonal flu vaccine has been exceptionally high, including in Northern Ireland. This will lead to a temporary pause on some aspects of the seasonal flu programme until further stock becomes available next month. Dr Gerry Waldron, Head of Health Protection at the Public Health Agency (PHA), said: “Demand for the flu vaccine this year has been phenomenal, and we are pleased that people have acted on the call to get it to help protect themselves and their loved ones. Flu alone can be a dangerous illness, but with coronavirus also in

A Public Health Agency (PHA) workplace health and wellbeing service, which has been supporting workers throughout the coronavirus pandemic, has been officially launched by the Health Minister Robin Swann. ‘Work Well Live Well’ initially began on 1 March 2020 in order to support businesses to improve the health, safety and wellbeing of employees within the workplace. However, with the beginning of lockdown and most businesses requiring employees to work from home, the service adapted to meet the new and diverse needs of these organisations. Supporting the initiative Health Minister Robin Swann

The Contact Tracing Service (CTS) is today taking a major step forward, moving to a ‘digital first’ model which will provide online self-service contact tracing for the majority of people who test positive. This innovative system will contact people with a positive test result by text message and provide them with a personal code which they can use at a dedicated website to input details of people with whom they were in recent close proximity. The identity of people using this service will be protected and will not be shared with those whose contact details they have provided. The information

The Public Health Agency (PHA) has introduced a new text alert model for close contacts of positive COVID-19 cases. This will strengthen the speed of the Contact Tracing Service (CTS) as case numbers, and the number of subsequent contacts, increases. Dr Gerry Waldron, Head of Health Protection at the PHA, said: “Contact tracing is an essential part of the Test, Trace and Protect programme. The model is kept under constant review and we have been working on developing an SMS text option to alert close contacts of confirmed cases as soon as their details are entered into our system, which means