All teenagers should receive meningitis vaccine at 15, health committee says

All teenagers in Britain should be offered free vaccinations against deadly meningitis, government advisers recommended.

An influential committee of health experts said young people should receive the jab at about 15, with catch up programmes for those who miss out.

The advise from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) follows a series of outbreaks of meningitis in the UK, with the most serious being in Kent earlier this year which killed two teenagers.

The JCVI is recommending a meningitis B (menB) booster jab on the NHS at age 15, for those who had the vaccine as a baby.

Those who missed out on the first immunisation will be offered two doses.

The first cohort to be vaccinated through the program will be youngsters turning 15 in 2030, under the proposal.

The JCVI also said it "strongly supports" giving two doses of the menB vaccine to children born on or before 30 April 2015, which they would receive at 15.

This age group were not offered the vaccine on the NHS as babies and so have missed out on protection as infants.

The JCVI added it would take a while for any programme to be implemented, so any catch-up initiative to vaccinate those who missed out was recommended.

The proposal is separate to another initiative to vaccinate about a million Year 13 students and those 25 starting universities this autumn on the NHS this summer.

The one-off programme was announced in response to the outbreak earlier this year that centred around the University of Kent and several schools.

Professor Wei Shen Lim, chairman of the JCVI, said: "Following the meningitis outbreaks in early 2026, a one-off programme for two-doses of menB vaccine is being offered to eligible young people this summer.

"We encourage everyone who is eligible to book an appointment online to receive the vaccine at a local pharmacy, in time for the second dose to be received before heading off to university or college.

"For protection, two doses of the menB vaccine are necessary, at least 28 days apart."

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He added that the Department of Health will now consider the proposal to expand the programme to more young people "with a decision to be made in due course".

Juliette Kenny, 18, was named as one of the victims of the Kent outbreak and her family have since been campaigning for teenagers and young people to be given access to the menB vaccine.

The other fatality was Lewis Waters, a sixth-form pupil at The Henley College in Oxfordshire.

The Kent outbreak was the fastest growing and largest seen in the UK, and other small clusters of meningitis cases since have also been bigger than expected.

Close and prolonged contact in halls of residence, shared homes and at social events can increase the risk of contracting menB, meaning that young people are especially vulnerable, health experts warn.

Dr Shamez Ladhani, consultant epidemiologist at the UK Health Security Agency, said previously the likely reason why there have been more meningitis clusters this year is that herd immunity is currently low.

"The most likely explanation is that we actually have had 25 years of declining cases of menB disease," he said.

"Now, meningococcal disease cycles go through cycles of 20 to 30 years.

"It goes down when you have good population immunity, and then that immunity goes down and new strains appear where the population doesn't have immunity against these strains, and then cases start going up again."

(c) Sky News 2026: All teenagers should receive meningitis vaccine at 15, health committee says