Evaluation of the COVID-19 vaccination rollout programme in Wales, and across the UK 

This project aims to provide evidence on the coverage and timeliness of COVID-19 vaccinations. It will look at: 

• Uptake disparities for COVID-19 and influenza vaccinations between 2020 and 2021. 
• The risk of COVID-19 hospital admissions and deaths after autumn 2022 booster vaccinations. 
• Associations with under-vaccination against COVID-19 in the summer of 2022 and subsequent risk of Covid-19 hospital admission and deaths. 
• Trends in SARS-CoV-2 infection and vaccination in school staff, students, and their household members from 2020-2022 in Wales 

Collectively, these questions will complement work taking place across the UK, aiding the monitoring and evaluation of vaccine equality. 

Inequalities in severe health events following infection from Covid-19 

This project will follow on from previous work that looked at health inequalities in COVID-19 deaths and hospital admissions in Wales. It will analyse admissions and deaths, looking at the mediating factors in inequalities following COVID-19. 

Long COVID – What is the effect on inequalities within society? 

This project will examine the prevalence and incidence of long-term COVID-19 effects in Wales, with the aim of identifying whether these effects vary across population groups. The findings will provide evidence on the number of recorded cases of Long Covid in Wales, aiding understanding of the coding quality, completeness, and usability of the data for future research. 

Patients’ interaction with primary care in Wales 

This project creates a highquality, researchready data asset of primary care records for the Welsh population by identifying GP transfers and removing duplicates. Using this dataset, we investigate how patient interactions (e.g., face-to-face, remote, and other types of consultations) changed during and after the COVID-19 pandemic compared with pre-pandemic patterns. The work also assesses how these shifts affected equality and equity of access to primary care, service utilisation, and potential health outcomes. 

ADR UK & CD3 (Cancer Data Driven Detection) programme collaboration 

This project showcases the SAIL Databank as a key usecase for the ADR UK–CD3 partnership by demonstrating how linked administrative and health data can support cancer research. Reports have been published that illustrate the potential of combining SAIL’s administrative data with other population-scale anonymised datasets to develop use-case examples, such as cancer-specific analyses or multifactorial risk models, and to highlight opportunities to advance cancer research through improved data linkage.