OVER 65-year-olds are set to be the next to receive the Covid-19 jab as the Gorvernment has met its target of vaccincating 15million people by mid-February.

Those with underlying health conditions and carers are also set to receive the vaccine next.

The top four priority groups have now been offered the vaccination.

Meanwhile ministers will be looking at data this week ahead of the road map out of lockdown, which will be announced on February 22.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock told Sky News: “There is no rest for the wicked and we are straight on to the next groups, so the letters have already been sent to over a million over 65-year-olds asking them to come forward, and also the next group after that is those who have underlying health conditions and are carers.

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“There is a huge programme under way rolling out to invite the next group of people to be vaccinated and, at the same time, from next month we have the second jabs of all the people who have come since January to make sure they happen on time, because they have to be within a specific 12-week time period.

“So there is still a huge amount of work to do but we have managed to vaccinate those who are most vulnerable.”

Mr Hancock said efforts would be made to reach those who are in the top four priority groups but had yet to be given a jab.

He did warn that it was too early to say whether the vaccincation programme had reduced Covid-related deaths.

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The Health Secretary told Sky News: “The signs are that, thankfully, the number of deaths is falling and has been coming down for a few weeks.

“It is too early to say whether that is directly due to the vaccination programme yet.

“It is too early to be able to measure the direct impact but of course we are looking at that and we can see overall that the number of cases is coming down sharply, the number in hospitals is coming down but it is still too high – at the latest count there were 23,000 people in hospital with Covid.”

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