Call for meningitis vaccine to be made available

Parents of children who have died of meningitis have called for a new vaccine for the B strain of the disease to be introduced here without delay.

The call comes as it was announced by the advisory committee on vaccinations in Britain that the vaccine will be included in the childhood immunisation programme there.

The vaccine was approved by the European Medicines Agency in November 2012. It was licensed by the European Commission in January of last year.