Published on 1 January 2026, the Department of Health and Social Care announced a £2 million pilot enabling health visiting teams to administer childhood vaccinations during routine contacts at home or in community settings. Twelve schemes will start from mid‑January across London, the Midlands, North East and Yorkshire, the North West and the South West, with a year‑long evaluation before a potential national rollout in 2027.
Officials described the model as a safety net rather than a replacement for practice‑based services. Health visitors-specialist public health nurses for families with children under five-will offer vaccinations during scheduled visits to increase access for families who might otherwise miss appointments.
Eligible households will be identified by the NHS using GP records, health visitor notes and local databases. The pilot focuses on families facing barriers such as travel costs, childcare pressures, language difficulties, lack of GP registration or vaccine hesitancy.
By providing vaccinations during routine health visiting contacts in homes or nearby clinics, the service removes the need for a separate trip to the surgery and is intended to lift uptake among children most at risk of missing doses. The Government set out the pilot as part of work to reduce inequalities in access to preventive care.
Staff participating in the pilot will receive additional training to hold constructive conversations with worried parents and to administer vaccines safely. The approach relies on existing trusted relationships between health visitors and families to strengthen confidence in routine immunisation.
Digital support will accompany the operational changes. DHSC said parents will be able to view and monitor their children’s health information in the NHS App via a new ‘My Children’ feature, presented as a modern replacement for the paper Red Book. This builds on NHS England’s proxy access capability in the NHS App and the Digital Child Health programme’s work to create a digital personal child health record.
Schedule changes take effect at the same time. From 1 January 2026, UKHSA guidance introduces the combined measles, mumps, rubella and varicella (MMRV) vaccine in place of MMR, with two doses at 12 and 18 months for children born on or after 1 July 2024 and a selective catch‑up for older children without previous chickenpox. DHSC’s announcement for parents indicates vaccinations will begin from 2 January 2026.
The pilot sits alongside the Government’s Family Hubs and Start for Life programmes, which expand early years support including health visiting. Ministers linked the initiative to wider vaccination activity, noting more than 18 million flu vaccinations delivered this autumn and over 60,000 additional NHS staff jabs compared with the same point last year, alongside the year‑round ‘Stay Strong. Get Vaccinated’ campaign.
Key milestones are the mid‑January go‑lives across the twelve sites, a 12‑month evaluation, and a decision on national rollout in 2027. Families should continue to obtain vaccinations via their GP surgeries in the first instance, with health visitors providing targeted support for those at risk of missing scheduled doses.