Join us for the UKHSA Conference 2026 at Manchester Central on Tuesday 22 and Wednesday 23 September. In partnership with the Faculty of Public Health (FPH), this year's conference theme is Securing health together: Partnership, prevention, preparedness.

Alongside leading voices from UKHSA, our plenary programme so far welcomes an impressive line-up of guest speakers and topics, with further announcements still to come -

• Charlotte Refsum (Tony Blair Institute for Global Change) and Saeed Alavi (Vice President for Vaccines and General Medicine, UK, GSK) on how the UK can become a global leader in health security innovation
• The BBC's Disinformation and Social Media Correspondent Marianna Spring and Cambridge University's Professor Sander van der Linden on prebunking misinformation
• Adam Kucharski (London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine) and Henrietta Hughes (Patient Safety Commissioner for England) on how AI could shape health security

Our featured abstracts track will also take centre stage for the first time, running alongside the main programme within the exhibition hall.

Visit the conference website for the latest information and to book your place. If you have any questions, please contact the conference team at conference@ukhsa.gov.uk.

The winter vaccines communications toolkit for stakeholders – produced jointly by UKHSA and NHS England – supports communications and public health professionals to promote winter vaccines including flu, COVID-19 and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).

It contains key messages, statistics, FAQs and resource links, information on how to order leaflets and posters, and social media assets.

It is available for download via the Campaign Resource Centre, alongside a range of resources to explain the value of winter vaccines, who is eligible and how they can get their vaccines. This includes range of new and updated assets to help explain the eligibility criteria for the flu, COVID-19 and RSV vaccines, which we encourage stakeholders to use on your channels. 

For further information about our national vaccine campaign and communications please contact: externalaffairs@ukhsa.gov.uk (UKHSA) or england.vaccinations-screening-communications@nhs.net (NHS England).

The NHS National Booking System (NBS) is now open, ahead of this year's flu vaccination programme launching on 1 September.

Pregnant women, and children aged 2 and 3 years old (on 31 August 2026), and children in a clinical risk group aged from 6 months to 17 years can book now for vaccinations that will begin from 1 September.

All other eligible cohorts – including people aged 65 and over, people who are immunocompromised or their close contacts, adults with certain long-term health conditions, care home residents and carers – can book now and select an appointment date and time from 1 October.

People can book via the NHS App, online at www.nhs.uk/bookflu, or by calling 119 if they cannot get online.

We are urging eligible people to book early so they are vaccinated in good time, before winter viruses start circulating widely, to give them you the best possible protection through the autumn and winter months.

Last week we published a new blog post explaining what is HPV and the effectiveness of the HPV vaccine.

Research published in the Lancet found that there were no deaths from cervical cancer between 2020 and 2024 among women aged 20 to 24 who had received the HPV vaccine at school. Vaccine coverage in this cohort was around 88% to 90%. However, in recent years uptake rates for HPV vaccination among girls and boys have fallen compared to rates seen before the pandemic, and we know that there are variations in the proportion of young people taking up the vaccine depending on where they are and the circumstances in which they live. There is a risk of growing numbers of young people missing out on the vital protection that the HPV vaccine provides.  

Stakeholders might wish to use the messaging in this blog post to encourage local awareness of catch-up eligibility (free until age 24, or 45 for higher-risk groups), and to remind communities that vaccinated individuals should still attend cervical screening, as the vaccine doesn't protect against every HPV type.

Last week, UKHSA published the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) annual report which shows around 50% fewer infants under 6 months being admitted to intensive care with RSV disease in England, with vaccine coverage slightly above 60%. Analyses of the older adult programme indicates a cut in hospitalisation rates by more than 40% among eligible adults aged 75 to 80, with vaccine coverage around 65%.

Since September 2024, the RSV vaccine has been offered to pregnant women (in order to protect infants) and older adults aged 75 to 79 years old. The programme was expanded on 1 April 2026 to also include all adults aged 80 years and over and all residents in care homes for older adults, who had not already received a dose through the initial programme.

On 1 September 2026, the programme will be expanded again to include adults aged 65 to 74 years in clinical at-risk groups as advised by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI). Those eligible include those with certain long-term chronic lung disease and those with immunosuppression due to disease or treatment.

We will be updating our RSV communications toolkit ahead of the new programme starting on 1 September for stakeholders and will share with colleagues when published.

Our vaccine communications toolkit has now been updated, and is available to download from the Find Public Health Resources website. 

Infectious diseases can be a particular risk for new student students as they start mixing with other students from lots of different locations, and they can spread quickly.

The vaccine communications toolkit provides information to help protect students from vaccine preventable infectious diseases. It includes a range of resources on vaccines including MenACWY, MenB, HPV and MMR and the diseases they protect against.

It is essential for all university and further education settings with residential student populations. It has been produced in collaboration with the devolved administrations, NHS England and meningitis charities.

Our all-partner MenB vaccination communications toolkit has recently been updated to include a series of assets for social media (1x1s and 4x5s) explaining eligibility for the MenB vaccine to use on your own channels. We also have posters and email signatures available to download. All of these resources are available on the Campaign Resource Centre.

Ourguide for teenagers and young people being offered the Meningococcal B (MenB) vaccine has also now been translated into various community languages, and accessible formats have been added.

A reminder that the one-off vaccination programme is being offered to:

• Everyone born between 01/09/2007 and 31/08/2008
• Young people under 25 (born on or after 21/07/2001) who will be starting higher education for the first time, or who will be starting further education for the first time as a residential student, in autumn 2026
• International students under 25 entering their first year of university. They should receive their first dose in their home country where possible to give the best chance of protection ahead of the start of the autumn term

Two doses of the vaccine are needed for protection at least 28 days apart.

Those born between between 01/09/2007 and 31/08/2008 can book via the NHS National Booking Service for appointments at community pharmacies. Other eligible people can contact a participating pharmacy to book an appointment.

The UK’s National Action Plan (NAP) for Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) 2024 to2029 sets out a coordinated strategy to reduce infections, optimise antimicrobial use, drive innovation, and strengthen the UK’s global leadership in tackling AMR

To support this strategy, a toolkit has been developed which brings together contributions from national, regional and local partners to support organisations in identifying and addressing health inequalities related to AMR. The toolkit collates and signposts to existing resources to enable a coordinated, UK‑wide approach while remaining adaptable to local contexts. It has been co-developed through collaboration across all 4 UK nations as part of the UK’s National Action Plan (NAP) for AMR 2024 to 2029.

Our latest measles data shows that measles continues to circulate in many parts of the country.

Between 1 January 2026 and 17 August 2026, there have been 970 laboratory-confirmed measles cases reported in England, exceeding the total number of cases in all of 2025. An additional 17 cases have been reported since the last publication on 3 August 2026. In 2026, measles activity started to increase in February, peaked in May and has declined since then.

The majority (591 out of 970, 61%) of these cases were in children aged 10 years and under, and 33% (320 out of 970) were in young people and adults aged 15 years and over (Table 1). 51% (496 out of 970) of these cases have been in London, 16% (153 out of 970) in the West Midlands, and 10% (99 out of 970) in the North West. However, all regions have reported at least one confirmed case with symptom onset since January 2026.

Three measles-related deaths have been reported to date in 2026: one was an acute measles death in a child, another was a death in a child due to late effects of measles, and the third was a death in an adult with an underlying immunological problem.