Maternal uptake of the RSV vaccine rates are at just 53%. This is a good start to a new vaccine programme, especially given its rapid rollout, but a continued concerted effort is required to ensure protection is offered to mothers whose babies will born in the most exposure-prone months.

Why attend

• To listen and learn from vaccine experts
• To understand how important it is to encourage women to get vaccinated
• To spend some time reflecting on how  as midwives you are in a unique position as being a trusted source of information.

Speakers

Trish Dyter, Senior Midwife and Vaccination Clinic Lead, Lewisham & Greenwich NHS Trust

Greta Hayward, Consultant Midwife, UKHSA Immunisation Programmes Division

Thomas Williams, Senior Clinical Research Fellow, University of Edinburgh

I am a Senior Clinical Research Fellow at the University of Edinburgh, and an Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Respiratory Medicine at the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People, Edinburgh. Since 2019 I have worked with the World Health Organisation on their RSV Global Surveillance Programme, and I am currently an honorary consultant for the United Kingdom Health Security Agency’s Respiratory Virus Unit. In 2021-2022 I led the BronchStart study , which provided detailed estimates of RSV disease burden to inform the decision to implement RSV maternal vaccination in the United Kingdom. This winter (2024-2025) I helped lead the BronchStop study, which aimed to understand the effectiveness of this newly introduced RSV maternal vaccine, and potential barriers to update.

MIDIRS Search Packs

• P159 Vaccination during pregnancy
• P201 Coronavirus (COVID-19) – vaccination in pregnancy
• PN131 Infant vaccination
• PN188 Infant vaccination in the United Kingdom
• PN189 Measles vaccination in infants
• PN190 Polio vaccine in infants

i-learn modules

• COVID19 vaccination in pregnancy (10 minutes)
• Flu vaccination in pregnant women (30 minutes)