Currently, the country’s overall number of infections is much higher than other European countries.

Vaccination rates for adolescents in the UK are lagging behind Europe.

Lawrence Young, a virus expert at Warwick University, said: `What is worrying now is that the vaccination program for children aged 12-15 years is not going very well.`

`With all these factors, not only schools but also the NHS are overwhelmed. Then the autumn and winter will become extremely terrible,` he said.

Last month, British health officials proposed vaccination for people aged 12-15 to reduce the risk of infection and resume school activities.

This leads experts to believe that the UK’s childhood vaccination program is starting too late.

`The goal of this campaign is to protect the educational environment, but we have not been able to do this,` Mr. Young said.

The NHS aims to vaccinate all children before the half-term break next week.

Students return to school at Weaverham High School after the UK relaxed social distancing, March 9.

Britain delayed vaccinating children following recommendations from the Joint Committee on Immunization (JCVI), arguing that its health benefits were negligible.

`We should not think that we have lost the golden time to vaccinate and benefit children or anyone, because vaccines are not very effective in preventing transmission, especially with the Delta variant.`

According to Mr. Finn, because the risks of infection and vaccination in healthy children are small, parents should decide for themselves whether to let their children receive vaccines or not.

`We allow people to make their own decisions,` he said.

In fact, the vaccine program in the UK is deployed through schools, meaning children will not be vaccinated at the same time.

On October 19, British Health Minister Sajid Javid announced that the UK would change its policy in the near future.

Despite a slow start, Dr. Brian Ferguson, Department of Immunology, University of Cambridge, said the childhood vaccination program is still effective if there is a clear strategy and plan.

`The current problem is that the process is slow, while the infection rate in this age group (12-18 years old) is still high,` he said.