THE UK’S biggest-ever vaccination programme got under way yesterday with a Dorset Hospital among the first to be involved in the national rollout.

Health workers in the county will be the first to get the coronavirus jab, followed by patients at highest priority, including those aged 80 and above.

Care home residents and carers will be next, followed by the rest of the population in the coming weeks and months.

The vaccine will be taken in two doses over two weeks and getting it to everyone will prove to be a huge logistical challenge up and down the country.

Dorset County Hospital in Dorchester is one of 53 NHS sites chosen by the government to receive the Pfizer and BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine.

Other sites involved include Portsmouth, Oxford and some London hospitals.Alastair Hutchison, the Chief Medical Officer at Dorset County Hospital, said getting ready to distribute the vaccine had been “a huge amount if work” and involved staff from many different departments.

He said nursing, administrative and pharmacy staff had all been involved and said a special freezer had been purchased to keep the vaccine at the very low temperature it requires.

The UK is the first country to approve the vaccine and the eyes of the world turned to a 90-year-old woman in Coventry when she became the first person in the world to have the vaccine outside of trials.

Grandmother-of-four Margaret Keenan received the vaccine at University Hospital, Coventry and she encouraged other people to follow suit.

She spoke of spending much of 2020 on her own as a result of the pandemic and added: “If I can have it at 90 then you can have it too.”

Mrs Keenan said being the first was “a privilege” and “the best early birthday present I could wish for” as it would mean she could spend time with her family and friends in the New Year “after being on my own for most of the year”.