Hertfordshire County Council has earmarked 12 sites that could be used by the NHS for the roll-out of the Covid vaccination programme.

This week the government announced that the first Covid vaccine had been approved by the medicines regulator MHRA.

The county council has been working with the NHS, to identify sites where the mass roll-out of the vaccine could be delivered in Hertfordshire.

The sites – which are not being revealed – have been identified by the county council and are being evaluated by council and NHS officials.

The work emerged at a meeting of the county council's resources and performance cabinet panel, on Thursday (December 2), when councillor's were being updated on the response to the Covid pandemic.

At the meeting Sass Pledger, the county council's assistant director for property, referenced the work of the 'logistics and sites cell'.

She said: "This has enabled us to work closely with NHS and other partners in terms of providing support both in terms of the current testing programme, the rapid testing programme that is emerging and also vaccination provision.

"We are actively involved in programmes around these three pieces of work. We are looking to support in any way we can – either through resources or through premises."

She said: "We were tasked with identifying 12 vaccination sites within Hertfordshire County Council.

"We have now got a provisional list of 12 sites , that we have put to the logistics and sites cell and they are undertaking stage two assessments with NHS colleagues to assess the viability of each of those."

Asked whether the use of council premises for testing or 'any other purpose' would help the council's financial position, assistant director of finance stressed that the council would not be seeking to profit from the vaccination programme.

"Where we incur new and additional costs we are in discussion with health partners to have those covered," said Mr Pilsworth.

"Where it is utilising our resources or sites but there is no direct additional cost to the council of doing so we wouldn't look to claim for that, we would make that available to support the programme."