Paddy Power offers shops for Covid-19 vaccine programme

Paddy Power is supporting an NHS England campaign to help facilitate the roll-out of the Covid-19 vaccination programme.

The Flutter Entertainment-owned bookmaker has offered its portfolio of 357 retail shops as a safe place to administer the injections.

It has also encouraged thousands of eligible staff to volunteer their services for the process should they wish to help out.

So far, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine and the Oxford University-AstraZeneca vaccine have been approved for use in the UK.

A Paddy Power spokesperson said: “The sooner we can all get vaccinated, the sooner we can get back to our lives – seeing family, and then promptly escaping them again at the football or the pub.

“But, seriously, if we can play even a small role in getting the country back on its feet, we’d be very proud.

“So, we are offering the use of our Paddy Power shops, and the staff who work in them, across the country,” they added.

A Flutter spokesperson commented: “We’re delighted to lend our support to such an important project and do our part to get the world back to normal as soon as possible.

“We will be encouraging our UK-based Flutter colleagues to volunteer if they wish to, as well as offering our shops as nationwide vaccination sites.

“Throughout the challenge of the pandemic our priorities have been, and continue to be, the wellbeing of our customers, supporting our colleagues and contributing towards the Covid-19 response of our local communities where we can.”

The bookmaker’s pledge was made as part of the The Sun newspaper’s Jabs Army campaign, which has also garnered support from companies including BT, British Airways and Sky TV.