THE major Worcestershire vaccination centre at the Artrix in Bromsgrove will see up to 2,500 vaccinations carried out per day when it is up and running.

At full capacity, the centre will be able to deliver 20 vaccinations every five minutes. 

The new centre is the first of its kind in Worcestershire and will open on Monday (January 25). 

Operating via a one-way system indoors, patients enter the main lobby of the theatre and walk round the back to check in and wait to be called.

From there, they walk through to the main theatre on the ground floor, or up to one of the rooms on the floors above, for their vaccination.

Traci Walker, operations manager for the site, said work has been going on to prepare the site since October last year, and there was a feeling of excitement around the building as the final preparations were made on Saturday morning.

She said: "After four weeks of extremely hard work from a lot of people, we have got there in the end. I'm just delighted that we are starting to fight this back."

Dr Gemma Moore, medical director for SW Healthcare, which is running the operation, said: "We're delighted to be opening on Monday to both frontline health and care staff, as well as some members of the public.

"It is absolutely fantastic to see the site come together. I was part of the first team to come and have a look at it as a theatre and helped influence having it as a mass vaccination site.

"It is going to be great, there's loads of parking, three floors and we can really get through big volumes of patients as long as the vaccine supply keeps coming."

Clare Gould, CEO of SW Healthcare, said: "We can accommodate up to two and half thousand vaccinations per day. Next week we will have eight 8,000 vaccines for the week.  

"We know there will be some short supply for the following two weeks, but after that we hope to be up to full capacity. 

"That's 20 vaccinations every five minutes."