HNZ: National Immunisation Programme update: 26 August 2022

Kia ora koutou health sector friends and colleagues,  

Hope you have had a great week and looking forward to the weekend with hopefully little or no rain.  Below you’ll find this week’s update from the team. Feel free to share this with your wider networks as relevant. 

COVID-19

Aotearoa Immunisation Register to launch a new vaccinator portal

We are excited to share with you that the Aotearoa Immunisation Register (AIR) is preparing to launch its new vaccinator portal.  

AIR’s vaccinator portal will support Vaccinators from all parts of the immunisation sector to record vaccinations and view vaccination history currently existing in the National Immunisation Register (NIR) and the COVID Immunisation Register (CIR).  

The portal is being developed in stages. A pilot is planned for late September, after which providers will be invited to adopt in defined stages.  

• In mid-October, AIR’s vaccinator portal will be available for Pharmacy to adopt. At this time, all users will be able to view vaccine history and record vaccines delivered by Pharmacy (excluding COVID and Flu which CIR will continue to be used for in the interim) 
• From mid-November, the ImmuniseNow portal (currently used by Pharmacy which connects into the NIR) will be closing 
• In mid-December, AIR’s vaccinator portal will be able to record additional vaccines, supporting other vaccinators to adopt (further detail will be provided about the exact vaccines that will be available at this time, in due course) 

Providers currently using electronic systems that are connected to the NIR (e.g., PMS in Primary Care) will not be impacted and will continue to record immunisations through their own systems. Work continues with health software vendors to develop the new AIR integrations. 

We are looking forward to sharing more with you over the coming weeks. Specific information on how to adopt will be distributed from mid-September. In the meantime, please send any questions to AIR.engagement@health.govt.nz       

Concluding the use of AstraZeneca as a COVID-19 vaccination

On 1 August, we advised that AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines is being phased out. The last day people can get AstraZeneca is 4 September. 

People who have had an AstraZeneca vaccine dose but have not finished their primary course, or have not had a booster should consider making a booking on or before 4 September. When booking, they need to be aware that if they have recently had COVID-19, they must wait 3 months before getting their next vaccination.
Anyone who previously received AstraZeneca, can still get Pfizer or Novavax vaccines for primary and booster vaccinations. They can book at BookMyVaccine.nz or call 0800 28 29 26. Check out our Facebook page on this here.

Provisional approval to extend age range for Novavax

You may have seen in some recent media about the Novavax vaccine being approved for people aged 12 years and over. Currently the Novavax COVID-19 Vaccine (Novaxavid) is available to all people 18 years and above as a primary dose or a booster dose. It is also available as a second booster dose for eligible people. 

Recently Medsafe granted provisional approval for Novaxavid as a primary dose for people between the ages of 12 and 17 years. The Ministry is currently considering whether to make this available to people of this age as part of the National Immunisation Programme. This decision will consider multiple factors including the provisional approval from Medsafe and the advice it will receive from the COVID-19 Vaccination Technical Advisory Group (CVTAG).

Until a decision is made a 12-17 year old individual can only access Novaxavid as a primary vaccination by obtaining a prescription from their medical practitioner.  If a decision is taken by Ministers to implement change, we will inform you of the implementation date. 

New collateral for the Back to the Islands campaign 

Last week we told you about our Back to the Islands national campaign to support Māori and Pacific vaccination events.  The campaign has been running since the 6^th of August, and there are now 7 weeks to go! We have added some new collateral into our Dropbox including some social tiles for Facebook for providers to use and share wider.

Find out more about the campaign by contacting Yvonne Timaloa  or Exeter Alofi  or have a squizz at the Back to the Islands collateral in our Dropbox: Back to the Islands.  

MMR

Boosting MMR vaccinations

As part of our strategy to help boost MMR vaccinations, we have developed a set of materials to help communicate with enrolled patients, including brochures, consent forms, social media assets and so on. You can find all these materials by following our Dropbox link: Dropbox: MMR resources.

The latest materials to be added to this folder are a series of SMS and email templates that General Practices and other health providers can use if they choose to, to contact enrolled patients. The templates have been developed with three distinct audiences in mind: parents of tamariki who are overdue for their first dose of the MMR vaccine; parents of tamariki who have missed their second dose; and people born between 1989 and 2004, who may have missed being vaccinated.  

REGULAR REMINDERS

Weekly vaccination data

Our latest Māori and Pacific COVID-19 vaccination data is now available here.

The most recent flu vaccination data is available here.

Collateral on Dropbox

Don’t forget we have a range of collateral you and your providers can use to promote vaccinations. Please feel free to share this link and the collateral widely: Dropbox: NIP – vaccine resources – Simplify your life. This week we have added collateral for the Back to the Islands campaign (see below)

You can also find a range of vaccination stories to share on our YouTube channel.

We are now sharing consent forms and policy statements for health professionals in a separate folder in the above Dropbox link. We also have available te reo Maori translations for Flu, Covid-19 and MMR consent forms. 

Ngā mihi nui,

Sandy

Sandy Thambiah

Senior Adviser, Engagement

National Immunisation Programme

waea pūkoro: +64 21 248 1288| īmēra: sandy.thambiah@health.govt.nz

133 Molesworth Street, Te Whanganui-a-Tara

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