NHS staff working on the frontline in the fight against coronavirus will be getting their first doses of the vaccine today (Monday).

Wye Valley NHS Trust has set up a hub at Hereford County Hospital ready for frontline health and social care staff to get the jab.

The trust's managing director said the doses were defrosting and vaccinators were "getting ready to vaccinate our frontline health and social care staff from this afternoon".

The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines need defrosting before being given as they are stored at ultra-low temperatures, and patients need two doses to achieve 95 per cent immunity.

Hereford Times: The coronavirus vaccine hub at Hereford County Hospital. Picture: Jane Ives The coronavirus vaccine hub at Hereford County Hospital. Picture: Jane Ives

Lucy Flanagan, director of nursing at the Wye Valley NHS Trust, said: "I work with an awesome team and on Monday we set up the Wye Valley NHS Trust hospital vaccination hub.

"We are ready and can't wait, couldn't have done it without fab colleagues."

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Vaccinations started in Herefordshire last month, with GP surgeries coming together to give out the jabs to people, as per the priority list from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI).

The group says the top three groups of people who need protecting first are residents in care homes for older adults and their carers, all those 80 years of age and over and frontline health and social care workers, and all those 75 years of age and over.

Care homes in Herefordshire have already described their excitement as more than 150 residents from five homes were given their first of two Covid-19 jabs.

Hereford Medical Group said more than 150 of its patients were given the first dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech coronavirus vaccination on Tuesday (December 29).

The owner and chief executive of Herefordshire Care Homes, which runs six properties in the county, said the first dose shows there is light at the end of the tunnel, and residents were thrilled to be given the dose.

"It's super-exciting, it's been pretty relentless for the last 10 months, as you can imagine," she said.

READ MORE: Herefordshire care homes excited as coronavirus jab arrives

It comes as the national rollout of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine begins, with 82-year-old former maintenance manager Brian Pinker the first person to receive the jab outside of clinical trials.

Government ministers have said the NHS has the capacity to deliver two million doses a week of the Oxford vaccine once it receives supplies from the manufacturers.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: "We have the capacity, the issue is to do with supply of the vaccine.

"It's not so much a manufacturing issue although that's part of it.

"Each batch needs to be properly approved and quality controlled."

The Oxford/AstraZeneca jab is easier to transport and store than the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, which needs cold storage of around minus 70C.

Because it can be stored at fridge temperatures, between two and eight degrees, it is easier to distribute to care homes and other locations across the UK.