The catch-up vaccination programme was introduced in summer 2014 to ensure young adults who received their initial dose of meningococcal C vaccine in childhood are protected from the disease when starting university, as it can spread quickly in shared accommodation.
The 2013/14 programme was initially scheduled to run until October 2014 but has been extended following reports of 21 cases of meningococcal disease in university students since September 2014.
The catch-up programme will run for several years until university entrants have received a dose of meningitis C vaccine routinely in adolescence.
Those who should be vaccinated are:
- students entering university who were born after September 1995 and received previous dose(s) of the vaccine when under 10 years of age
- any other student who is unimmunised or partially immunised against meningitis C.
View meningitis vaccine drug records