One in three young people in Manchester are still not vaccinated against Covid-19

Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham has urged young people in the city-region who are yet to receive their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine to come forward and book an appointment.

Mr Burnham appealed to the one in three under-30s in the city-region who are yet to have any vaccine dose to get jabbed in order to protect themselves and their friends, family members and neighbours.

The elected mayor spoke out on the issue at his latest press briefing on Wednesday (8 December) as Greater Manchester marked a year since the vaccination programme got under way.

The conference also went through the latest statistics on Covid-19 and discussed the emergence of the Omicron variant here.

What did Mr Burnham say to young unvaccinated Greater Manchester residents?

Mr Burnham said that around two-thirds of people aged 18 to 29 had had their first dose and he wanted to say that figure rise.

He said: “One in three people who are between 18 and 29 have not had their first dose. If you are one of those in that age group please go and get it now.

“In doing so you will be able to protect yourself, your family, your friends and your neighbours ahead of the coming winter.

“This is a window of opportunity to get out there ahead of Omicron and get your first dose. That will help everybody and put Greater Manchester in a strong position to deal with what’s coming.”

‘Omicron is here’

Mr Burnham said that in the week since his previous press briefing, the position had “increased significantly” in terms of probable or possible cases of the Omicron variant from the original two highly-probable cases in Bolton.

However, he also said that the latest seven-day case rate for Greater Manchester up to 3 December of 392.5 per 100,000 residents was below the England-wide rate of 490.

Mr Burnham said that even though the city-region had seen a week-on-week rise in the case rate the comparison with the national picture meant Greater Manchester was still in a fairly good position to meet the challenge of the new variant.

He said: “There’s a sense that there’s a wave coming but we’ve more ability than we’ve had before to protect ourselves from what is coming.

“Omicron figures are rising fairly quickly, and they are considered to be an under-estimation of levels of community transmission. Omicron is here and it is spreading in our communities.

“It’s looking like it is far more transmissible, although it’s important to stress that there’s no evidence it is more virulent.

“The challenge is very much with us but we have a little more headroom than other parts of the country.”

What else did the data show?

Mr Burnham said the case rate for over-60s was “a really encouraging picture” with a week-on-week decrease in the latest figures for Greater Manchester.

The pressure of Covid-19 on hospitals is also lessening though Mr Burnham stressed that the picture for the NHS as a whole remains extremely challenging with seasonal viruses and attendances linked to people socialising at this time of year.

Mr Burnham said he was also particularly encouraged by the vaccination figure that showed 87% of residents aged between 50 and 69 have now received both doses.

Greater Manchester as a whole has also just gone over the two million mark for first doses.