Covid-19 vaccinations being carried out at Seaton Hospital - and 91-year-old Ted is first in line

Coronovirus vaccines for the over 80s will be administered next week at Seaton Hospital.

And county councillor Martin Shaw has revealed on his Seaton Matters blog that 91-year-old Ted Gosling, curator of Seaton Museum and Freeman of Seaton, will be the first to receive the Pfizer vaccine, developed in Germany.

This is the first step towards eliminating the virus and Ted agreed to take it "like a shot".

Cllr Shaw writes: "It's equally good news that Seaton Hospital is being used for the vaccinations. This is a good demonstration of why we will need to keep all our community hospitals in the post-Covid world.

"We suggested earlier this year that Seaton Hospital could be used for step-down care from the acute hospital, at the time when the NHS were tragically following the Government recommendation to send patients into care homes. Now at last the NHS are putting our hospital to good use."

Commenting on an increase in Covid-19 cases in East Devon, Cllr Shaw said: "Sadly Tier 2 reflects the reality that East Devon has more cases – we need a consistent effort to suppress Covid until vaccines are available."

Seaton residents are asked to wait until they are contacted by the hospital or their GP to be called for the vaccine, and should not call in or turn up to vaccine clinics without an appointment.