VACCINE ROLL OUT IN NORTH CORK STALLED

A nationwide problem with the delivery of over 80s vaccinations has caused the planned roll out of the next age cohort in Mitchelstown to be stalled.

Julie Beamish of the Livinghealth Clinic, said they had hoped to administer their one thousandth vaccination, starting on Wednesday this week.

But this has now been put back by two weeks due to the HSE cancelling the supply of vaccines.

“We are very disappointed that we have been unable to vaccinate those patients in the 75–79 age cohort due to the HSE cancelling our supply of the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine originally due for delivery on Wednesday,” she said.

“We will still be administering the second dose to our over 85 cohort this Thursday and Friday.

“We still remain well prepared to run our Covid vaccination clinics once the HSE supply of Pfizer BioNTech vaccine is restored to us and hope to be back in touch with patients within the next two weeks,” she added.

Julie said the team at Livinghealth had a very successful vaccination campaign and had been very excited to get the doses administered.

LOGISTICAL-PLANNING PROBLEM

Some speculation is centred around some smaller GP surgeries across the country struggling to manage the roll out.

The Livinghealth vaccination issue is mirrored in other locations and has nothing to do with the ongoing problem associated with AstraZeneca, with the HSE having paused its use for now. It is, instead, an Ireland-wide logistical and planning problem by health officials.

European health bosses have agreed an accelerated delivery of the BioNTech-Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine, with 10 million doses for the second quarter of the year. The doses would be drawn forward from the option of 100 million doses in the second agreed BioNTech-Pfizer contract, which were due for the last two quarters of the year. It is anticipated that the European Commission’s proposal will be adopted by member states.

Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, said she was aware how critical quarter two is for the rollout of the vaccination strategies across member states.

“These accelerated 10 million doses will bring the total doses of BioNTech-Pfizer in Quarter 2 up to over 200 million. This is very good news. It gives member states room to manoeuvre and possibly fill gaps in deliveries,” she said.

It was reported on Tuesday that the Limerick vaccination centre in the Radisson Blu Hotel was at a standstill, due to only having stocks of AstraZeneca.

The AstraZeneca vaccine has been halted, in Ireland and elsewhere, due to concerns raised by Norwegian scientists around the problem of clotting.

A statement has been requested from the HSE.