January 2021

Dear john,

I want to start by wishing you a Happy New Year! Unfortunantly, this year has not started in the way we all would have hoped for and we are now in a new National Lockdown.

I know this lockdown will be difficult for people and businesses across our local community, especially since Northumberland has been under tighter local restrictions since September. 

There are reasons to be optimistic. We are rolling out the largest vaccination programme in our history. This week, the NHS began rolling out the Oxford AstraZeneca Vaccine, and we have already vaccinated more people than in the rest of Europe combined. As the Prime Minister said in his statement on Monday, the hope is that by mid-February, everyone who is in a care home, over 70 years old, doing a frontline health or social care job, or clinically extremely vulnerable will have had a first dose of the vaccine.