The NHS vaccine website had 'technical difficulties' as thousands rushed to book a booster tonight

The NHS vaccine website had ‘technical difficulties’ as thousands rushed to book a booster tonight (Picture: PA)

The official website to book Covid vaccines crashed this evening minutes after the prime minister announced we were facing a ‘tidal wave’ of Omicron infections and urged people to book their booster jabs.


He said that the rollout would be accelerated, setting a target for every eligible adult to be offered a booster by the end of December – a month earlier than previously planned.


As thousands rushed to try and book, the NHS website couldn’t handle the increased demand and told people it was ‘currently experiencing technical difficulties.


‘We are working to resolve these issues. Thank you for your patience.’


It comes after the PM warned that the new variant could cause ‘very many deaths’ and that Britain ‘must urgently reinforce our wall of vaccine protection’.


It means everyone over 18 who had their second jab over three months ago will be able to book a booster online from Wednesday, or go to many walk-in clinics from tomorrow.




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The NHS website usually tells people they are in queue, and gives the number of how many people are before them and how long they should expect to wait.


It was working again by later in the evening, though still showing high demand.


One woman tonight shared a screenshot showing that she was told over 20,000 people were ahead of her, only to be ‘kicked out’ by the website once she got to the front of the queue.


Others told how they were just shown the error message.


Some said this was a reassuring sign that people were responding to the call to get jabbed, but others saw it as a failure to prepare.


During the televised address tonight, Mr Johnson said scientists had discovered that being fully vaccinated with two doses is ‘simply not enough’ to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus mutation and without speeding up the booster campaign, the NHS could be overwhelmed.


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