The impact of COVID-19 vaccines in pregnancy, children and young people, and vulnerable groups (DaC-VaP-2)

This project works to use UK-wide data to study the uptake, safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines.

The project was awarded through a funding call by Health Data Research UK and the Alan Turing Institute, and is led by Professor Aziz Sheikh.

Summary (Research in a nutshell)

There are many questions that need to be answered about the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines.

Building on our earlier work, we engaged with a range of patient, public, community, professional and health policy groups who told us the following questions are the most important to them:

‘What is the uptake, safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines’: for the following groups:

in pregnancy
in children and young people
when given as booster doses
on disease caused by different variants?'

We will research the answers to the questions. The research will use linked datasets from across the UK. These will include general practitioner, vaccination, testing, viral sequencing, hospitalisation and death data. Trained, approved data analysts will have access to the data in secure and safe settings. This means people can be confident that health data is being accessed securely and privacy protected.

We will be able to replicate findings in different national data sources and pool results on up to 55 million people across the UK.

This work is beneficial to the public. Our patient and public involvement work has shown the importance of these questions. Our work will help to increase the confidence of the public in the COVID-19 vaccines.

We will continue to work with the UK’s Chief Medical Officers, Chief Scientific Advisers, and government and vaccine bodies—in particular, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency—so they are aware of our work and they will be ready to use our results to inform national decisions that benefit the public.

Key people

Name	Role	Affiliation
Aziz Sheikh	Senior Investigator	University of Edinburgh / BREATHE - Health Data Research Hub for Respiratory Health / EAVE II
Simon de Lusignan	Senior Investigator - England	University of Oxford / Royal College of General Practitioners Research Surveillance Centre
Richard Hobbs	Senior Investigator - England	University of Oxford
Jenni Quint	Senior Investigator - England	Imperial College London / BREATHE - Health Data Research Hub for Respiratory Health
Vahe Nafilyan	Senior Investigator - England	Office for National Statistics
Mark Joy	Core researcher - England	University of Oxford
Chris Robertson	Senior Investigator - Scotland	University of Strathclyde / PHS / EAVE II
Steven Kerr	Core researcher - Scotland	University of Edinburgh
Declan Bradley	Senior Investigator - Northern Ireland	Queen’s University Belfast / Public Health Agency
Dermot O’Reilly	Senior Investigator - Northern Ireland	Queen’s University Belfast
Siobhan Murphy	Core researcher - Northern Ireland	Queen’s University Belfast
Ronan Lyons	Senior Investigator - Wales	Swansea University / SAIL Databank
Ashley Akbari	Senior Investigator - Wales	Swansea University / SAIL Databank
Stuart Bedston	Core researcher - Wales	Swansea University
Antony Chuter	Patient and Public Involvement Lead
Jillian Beggs	Patient and Public Involvement Lead
Tracy Jackson	Patient and Public Involvement Research Fellow	University of Edinburgh
Susan Buckingham	Communications and Engagement Manager	University of Edinburgh
Dominique Balharry	Research Manager	University of Edinburgh
Morag Edwards	Research Administrator	University of Edinburgh

Key publications

This project builds on the first DaC-VaP project which ran from January to October 2021. The DaC-VaP team have contributed to publications that have informed the UK and Scottish Government responses to the pandemic, as well as our understanding of the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines.

Timeline

November 2021 – September 2022

Key Collaborations

BREATHE - Health Data Research Hub for Respiratory Health

EAVE II - Early Pandemic Evaluation and Enhanced Surveillance of COVID-19 study

Health Data Research UK

Imperial College London

Office for National Statistics

Queen's University Belfast

Royal College of General Practitioners Research Surveillance Centre

Swansea University

SAIL Databank

University of Oxford

University of Strathclyde

Partners and Funders

This project is part of the Data and Connectivity National Core Study - working to make vital data available to accelerate research on COVID-19. Data and Connectivity is led by Health Data Research UK, in partnership with the Office for National Statistics, funded by UK Research and Innovation and delivered alongside a UK-wde network of delivery partners. This work was also supported by The Alan Turing Institute via 'Towards Turing 2.0' EPSRC Grant Funding.