Hertfordshire schools have been receiving hoax Covid vaccine consent letters - with at least one school allegedly passing the letter on to parents.

The NHS England medical director has warned parents across the country of the anti-vaccine letters after three million youngsters aged 12-15 became eligible to receive a first Covid jab.

The "consent checklist" sent to schools, under a fake NHS logo, asks for it to be shared with students.

NHS medical director for Covid immunisation Dr Jonathan Leach said on Twitter: "Just to confirm that this is not a legitimate NHS form."

The form includes a series of negative claims about the risks of vaccinations.

It includes claims such as the vaccine being a risk for "strokes, blindness, deafness, clotting, miscarriages, anaphylaxis and cardiovascular disorders" and data on the number of deaths of people after one jab and the number of adverse reactions to the jab "officially reported".

After a series of statements, the "patient or carer" is asked to sign to give their "informed consent to receive an experimental Covid-19 vaccine, for which the long-term effects are unknown".

According to a Twitter exchange, at least one school in Hertfordshire has fallen for the fake consent form and unwittingly passed it onto parents.

Responding to a tweet of an image of the form captioned: "This has been sent out by at least one Herts school", the director of public health at Hertfordshire County Council, Jim McManus said: "Thanks for drawing our attention to this. Clarification has been sent to schools that this form and these comms (communications) are to be ignored. Very grateful for your help."

Mr McManus told this paper: "We are aware that bogus information about the Covid-19 vaccination, including a fake consent form, has been shared with some secondary schools and also directly with some children, young people and parents.

"We have confirmed with schools that official communications about vaccinations for 12-15 year-olds will come only from a secure verified source to ensure schools can have confidence that what they receive is accurate and trustable.  

"Despite the huge amount of misinformation circulating both on and offline about vaccinations and Covid-19, the fact remains that vaccination – if you are eligible – is the best way of keeping yourself and others safe. Our position on vaccinations is quite clear, please get vaccinated. The vaccines have already saved thousands of lives and stopped many more people from getting seriously ill.

"We understand that some young people and their parents may be anxious about the vaccination, our advice is to please visit only www.nhs.uk or https://covid.healthierfuture.org.uk to get trustable, accurate and up to date information from trusted sources and to discuss the options together."

Any unauthorised use of the NHS logo was taken very seriously, said a spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Social Care told the BBC.

The spokeswoman added: "Misinformation about the vaccine is dangerous and costs lives. We are continuing to do everything we can, working with local authorities and our NHS, to counter the spread of untruths with public information that is grounded in science and facts."