ST HELENS RFC’s stadium will be the site of the mass Covid-19 vaccination centre in Cheshire and Merseyside, it has been announced.

Led by St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, the centre will open at the Totally Wicked Stadium on Monday, using the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine.

The venue is an additional option for the people of Cheshire and Merseyside to choose when they are contacted to have their vaccine, alongside primary care and local pharmacy venues.

Vaccination will be by appointment only and members of the public are asked not to attend the stadium unless they have been contacted by the NHS.

Those in the government’s priority groups will be contacted first and given the option of the St Helens venue.

You can still wait for a more local appointment in Warrington however.

Residents in Warrington have also been given the option of getting the jab at the home of Widnes Vikings.

Orford Park and The Halliwell Jones Stadium are also being used for vaccinations.

Professor Kevin Hardy, vaccination centre medical director, said: “This is an exciting step in the national Covid-19 vaccination programme and great news for the people of Cheshire and Merseyside that the first large-scale vaccination centre is opening in the area.

“When the St Helens centre is fully operational, we will be vaccinating thousands of people each week and it means that we can move through those priority groups at a greater pace and ensure that we can protect many more people as soon possible.”

Saints’ ground has long been eyed as a venue for a regional mass vaccination centre, with local GPs using the stadium to carry out mass vaccinations.