Seqirus, the manufacturer of Fluad – the only vaccine pharmacies can offer over-65s, according to NHS England guidance – made the statement after two contractors raised concerns on Twitter that their orders had been “lost”.

“We experienced some processing challenges during the ordering period due to the sudden high volume of requests,” Seqirus told C+D on Monday (September 3).

“However, we believe this impacted a relatively small number of orders and that the majority of issues have been resolved.”

While it has been unable to fulfil late orders for Fluad “due to high global demand”, Seqirus stressed that there will be “sufficient quantities” of the vaccine available this flu season.

“We’ve processed more than 8,500 orders for Fluad from [GP] practices and pharmacies across the UK, totalling almost 9.3 million doses,” Seqirus added.

Deliveries “on track”

Community pharmacists were given the official go-ahead last week to start providing flu vaccinations last Saturday (September 1).

Seqirus said it has started its “first phase of deliveries and remains on track to meet the timetable for all other phases”.

C+D reported last week that wholesalers will not be able to supply additional Fluad vaccines to pharmacies that missed this season’s order deadline.

A total of 8,987 community pharmacies – 77% of all pharmacies in England – signed up to provide last season's national flu service, delivering a total of more than 1.3 million vaccinations.