Covid jabs will be available on sale at Boots for the first time next week

COVID jabs will be available in Boots from next week as they go on sale for the first time.

Anyone over the age of 12 who is not eligible for a free NHS booster will be able to buy a Pfizer shot for £99.

Companies are allowed to sell the vaccine now that the pandemic is no longer a health emergency.

Health minister Maria Caulfield said this week: “Covid-19 is now recognised as an established and ongoing health issue.”

The next NHS jabs rollout, starting on April 15, will only include over-75s, care home residents and people with weak immune systems.

It has been more than two years since vaccines were last offered to healthy under-50s.

Boots will begin selling jabs from the beginning of April.

A spokesperson said: “We are launching a private Covid-19 vaccination service for people who are not eligible for an NHS vaccination but still want the option to protect themselves from the virus.

“Our private service builds on our existing delivery of Covid-19 vaccinations for the NHS, as we have done with flu vaccinations for many years.”

Hospital admissions dwarfed by the peak of the second wave

Appointments will first be available to book at around 50 of Boots’ more than 2,000 stores.

Superdrug said it is in talks to start offering the same service later this year.

Around 400 people are currently being treated for Covid in hospitals in England, following a peak of 1,300 in the winter.

It compares to almost 35,000 at the height of the crisis in January 2021 before vaccines were rolled out.

Most people now only suffer a cold or flu-like illness.

A Pfizer spokesperson said: “Vaccines remain an important pillar in helping to prevent serious illness or hospitalisation as a result of Covid-19.”