Wimbledon Mosque administers 1,000 vaccines in one day as hundreds of young people queue “around the block”

By Tara O’Connor, Local Democracy Reporter

Hundreds of young people queued for hours outside Wimbledon Mosque yesterday to get their first dose of the coronavirus vaccine.

The walk-in centre ended up opening until midnight and administering about 1,000 vaccinations.

Local councillor Adam Bush was involved in the organisation of the event and says it shows how keen young people are to get vaccinated.

He said: “At the beginning it was for people over 35 on Monday, we had about 25 people turn up.

“They dropped the age to 25 plus and got 1,000 people done. It started at 4pm and by 4.15pm there were queues around the block.

“This shows the uptake of the vaccine within the younger population is good, I thought they might be a little but hestiant but I was getting non stop messages after I tweeted about it.”

Cllr Bush, who is 33, has had both of his vaccinations as he has asthma.

The centre at Wimbledon Mosque was due to close at 10pm but ended up staying open until midnight when there were doses left.

He added: “We had people travelling from quite a distance.

“At 10pm I put out a Tweet that we had 200 doses left and within 30 minutes we had 400 people turn up at the mosque.”

Those who couldn’t get their vaccination were given an appointment later in the week.

A similar walk-in vaccination centre is open today (Wednesday, June 2) until 10pm at the Wilson Hospital in Mitcham.

It is open to anyone over 25 who has not yet received a jab.