Why I choose to be a vaccinator: Faraz Ahmed's story

This was a brand-new vaccine and we had to clinically understand patient eligibility and protocols, ascertain how best to implement this and explain things to the public in a way they would understand. We created child friendly environments for the 5-11 and 12-15 age groups which was recognised nationally.

At the height of operations we were doing over 1000 vaccinations per day and achieved 1468 on our busiest day.

Has it lived up to its expectations for you?

Working in the vaccination world had its challenges: there were periods where it slowed down and rapidly pick up as new cohorts became eligible throughout the year. Tipton was supposed to be short term, but we were there for almost two years. It was, without a doubt, the best job of my life.

The thing is, that latter point still rings true. Due to the fantastic efforts of so many, the mortality rate is now low, but COVID is still here and still evolving. Making sure you’re vaccinated still ensures you are looking after yourself and the people you love and care for.

Crucially, this season we are dealing with extremely high rates of flu: the virus has skyrocketed, and it can seem that people aren’t aware of the numbers or of how dangerous it can be.

In your view, what’s deterring people? I think some people are feeling vaccine fatigue, but as I said before, we need to remember how crucial it is to protect ourselves.

We met with pharmacist Faraz Ahmed to learn more about his role in the team and why he chose to work in the vaccination programme.

When did you start working at SWB?

I started at SWB in January 2021, joining the vaccination programme.

From 2015 I was working in community pharmacy. I enjoyed the environment but was interested in moving into another area.

I was working, but I wasn’t necessarily enjoying my work. Late one day I responded to a posting about a vaccination pharmacist role, requiring availability at short notice. The next day I was at Walsall Manor and I started working on their vaccination programme.

What attracted you to working on the vaccination programme, and how did you begin?

I wanted to find something I enjoyed and to make a difference. I moved from Walsall to the Dudley Group NHS Trust, working at Russell’s Hall and then as part of a regional COVID-19 vaccination programme. When I started at SWB, I trained 30 pharmacists alongside the SWB pharmacy team who would be starting at Tipton – we would have anywhere between 8 and 16 pharmacists staffed per day as part of a multi-disciplinary. We had staff from all sorts of backgrounds such as nurses, paramedics, midwives, students and many more.

It was a learning curve managing a team of that size: I myself had 15 other pharmacists that I looked after, including prescribers and non-prescribers and across multiple sites. There were many obstacles.

I’m so glad that I was able to move into a role where I worked to help so many people during lockdown. I felt I was on the frontlines of history; to be delivering the programme at that scale, both to the public and helping to input into hospital processes, was amazing. I have met so many individuals who are now lifelong friends and I’m immensely proud of what we achieved. We won three awards within the programme – a Star Award, an LGC award, and a regional award for what we did with Toy Town, to make vaccination child friendly. Which shows the incredible team we had across all SWB sites.

How did you work with vulnerable groups?

We had several clinics running at the same time. We wanted to target health inequalities, and to this end we reached out to schools, care homes, community centres; spaces where we knew we would be able to reach people.

To encourage uptake, we put on specific clinics: asylum seekers, homeless people, women-only, specific faith groups, and those without regular NHS care.

We’ve seen much lower levels of vaccine uptake this season than in previous years, where people were clamouring to get vaccinated. Why do you think this is?

I think that during the pandemic, during lockdown, vaccines were seen as passports to freedom. People couldn’t wait to get out and about, to travel, and they felt vaccines would give them access to this.

Comparing this with now, people have that freedom again and can get out and about. I think people don’t see the value in the vaccines in the same way as when we were in the height of a pandemic.

But we’re forgetting that most importantly, large numbers of people were dying. Everyone wanted to be safe and to protect their loved ones.

There’s also a misconception that you will feel really ill after a vaccination. Whilst minor symptoms are common, they are completely normal after a vaccine, and usually go after 48 hours.

Some believe that you can contract the actual illness from the vaccination itself. At no point can this happen. Vaccines work in one of two ways: they either give you an inactive strain, or they give you genetic material which helps you to fight it. Flu vaccines are the former, COVID vaccines are the latter: they’re mRNA vaccines involving the use of a spike protein which enables your body to develop antibodies to fight the virus.

The technology for both types of vaccine has been around for years and is extremely well tested and safe to use.

What would you say to someone in healthcare who would rather take the risk and not get vaccinated?

We can’t advocate for a service we wouldn’t have ourselves: I believe that as healthcare professionals, it’s our responsibility to get vaccinated. I myself have had all the COVID jabs and boosters, as well as my flu vaccination.

When we’re talking about the individual, getting vaccinated allows your body to build immunity and lessens the severity of your symptoms, allowing you to fight the virus more easily.

Vaccinations won’t stop you from getting the condition but will provide you with protection for yourself and those around you. What they do is so important.

The greater the number of people who get vaccinated, the more likely we are reduce the severity of it to the population and the less likely that a vulnerable person will catch that virus. We have eradicated viruses before through vaccination. I think we need to think of ourselves as part of the group and remember how important it is to protect each other.