A MASS vaccination hub due to open in Furness will 'help enormously' to deliver the jab to residents, an MP has said.

The hub, on the GlaxoSmithKline site at Ulverston is due to open next week.

Existing centres of this kind have been able to vaccinate thousands of people every week.

They have been made available for anyone within a 45-minute drive of the sites.

Jane Scattergood, the Covid-19 vaccination director for the Lancashire and South Cumbria Integrated Care System said: “As the expansion of the Covid vaccination programme continues to gather pace, we are planning to open a large-scale site in Ulverston in the coming weeks.

"GPs, nurses, pharmacists, other staff, and volunteers are working hard behind the scenes to get the site ready. As with other vaccination services, people should wait to be invited by the NHS.

“The rollout of the vaccine and establishing these sites involves a wide range of organisations working together.

"We need to thank the significant support to the NHS to deliver the Covid vaccination programme from our wider partners including Cumbria County Council, Lancashire County Council, Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council, Blackpool Council, our district councils, the military, police, local businesses and many more.”

Barrow and Furness MP praised the centre and GSK ahead of the opening.

He said: "This is a really welcome development - it will help enormously to get through the next stages of the vaccination programme and take considerable pressure off GPs who are currently managing the bulk of this work while also doing their day jobs. Huge thanks are due to GSK and the club members for giving over the facility."

The Government has promised all the over-70s, the extremely clinically vulnerable and frontline health and care workers - about 15 million people - will be offered a jab by mid-February.

By the end of Friday, 5.9 million people had received their first dose of the vaccine across the UK.

Based on the latest figures, an average of 397,333 first doses of vaccine would be needed each day in order to meet the Government's target.