Travel limits to be eased despite rising number of Covid-19 cases

Micheál Martin has warned that Ireland could well face further restrictions in January even as a vaccine programme gets under way. Picture: PA

The lifting of Covid-19 travel restrictions will go ahead on Friday despite rising case numbers and the emergence of a new strain of the coronavirus in England.

However, Micheál Martin has warned that fresh restrictions are likely in January and said the roll-out of vaccines will take several months, stressing that it could be June before the country is opened up fully.

Senior Government sources, speaking to the Irish Examiner, have confirmed that current proposals to lift travel restrictions from this weekend will remain in place even if case numbers continue to rise.

The Cabinet also meets today to approve the crucial vaccination task force report, described as a ‘living document’ on the roll-out of vaccines which will change and adapt as new data becomes available.

Ministers will be told of the five key strands for the vaccine roll-out operation from January.

These are centred around hospitals, long-term residential care homes, served by mobile units from the nearest hospital, centralised mass vaccination centres, GP clinics, and community pharmacies.
Once broader sections of society are vaccinated, GPs and pharmacies will play a bigger role.

The vaccine roll-out will need to run in tandem with continued adherence to public health guidance on social distancing, masks, and hand sanitisation.

Ministers will hear that Ireland is signed up to at least five advance purchase agreements for vaccines, which if all approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) would provide at least 14m vaccine doses.

As part of its vaccine deployment plan, ministers will hear that the storage and distribution of multiple Covid-19 vaccines will be “complex with different needs” for different groups and vaccine types.

Under sequencing plans, care home residents over the age of 65 and staff at these facilities will receive the vaccine first.

Next in line will be frontline healthcare workers in direct patient contact roles, and then those aged 70 and older in the general population, with those aged 85-plus receiving the vaccine first among that cohort.

The Taoiseach said: “I think your optimal period is moving towards to May/June period, and then we’ll be completely open after that. 

"So there is a kind of a staged timeline approach, depending on the availability of the vaccine, the manufacturing of the vaccine, and as they come into the country.”

A third lockdown in January is possible, but a decision is not due until the new year, Mr Martin said.

"You could very well be looking at some further restrictions in January," he said, adding that the Government will look at the data before making decisions.

Meanwhile, UK health secretary Matt Hancock told the House of Commons that a new variant of coronavirus has been found which is growing faster in some parts of England.

UK health minister Matt Hancock giving a media briefing on coronavirus yesterday when he detailed the discovery of a new strain of Covid-19 in the south of England. Picture: Tolga Akmen/PA

He said at least 60 different local authorities had recorded Covid infections caused by the new variant.

"We've currently identified over 1,000 cases with this variant, predominantly in the south of England although cases have been identified in nearly 60 different local authority areas. We do not know the extent to which this is because of the new variant,” he said.

Responding in Dublin, deputy chief medical officer Ronan Glynn said it is “too early” to know if the new strain of the coronavirus has emerged in Ireland.

Dr Glynn said Irish authorities only received formal notification of the new strain yesterday at the same time the UK government publicly made the announcement.

“There is very little information available on us at the moment,” Dr Glynn said.

“It's really too early at this stage to say whether or not it has any such effects. We just really need to wait for more information to come out. It's too early at this stage to say whether the variant has been seen in this country,” he added.