Stephen Donnelly 'very, very excited' about Covid-19 vaccinations before the New Year

The government published their Covid-19 vaccine distribution plan yesterday. File picture.

The Health Minister has described as "very very exciting" the prospect of getting people vaccinated against Covid before the New Year.

However, Stephen Donnelly has warned that very small numbers of people will receive the vaccine first, though he said the distribution plan and IT systems will be in place to allow for immediate vaccinations no matter what volume of injections are delivered. 

He said the initial batch of vaccines delivered will be "in the thousands".

EMA sign off brought forward

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has announced that it is bringing forward its decision on the Pfizer vaccine, which means sign off on it is likely to now be made on December 23 instead of December 29.

"If that does happen, we could well be seeing low numbers to begin with, but we could be looking at the start of vaccinations before the New Year," said Mr Donnelly. 

"In the first instance, it's men and women over 65 in long term residential care settings including nursing homes. Why? Because they are most at risk and remember tragically in the first wave over half of the people who died were in these settings.

After that, it's the frontline healthcare workers who are in direct patient contact, and then we move down through ages and people with underlying conditions. 

"Exactly how that will be done depends on a variety of things, it depends on technical information that our expert group is looking for from the European Medicines Agency as part of its validation process."

He added: "It depends on the vaccines themselves, so for example, the Pfizer vaccine has to be stored at an ultra low temperature at -70 degrees Celsius. It's not the kind of thing that a GP surgery or pharmacy could have."

Vaccine certification

However, he said the Moderna vaccine, which is due to be made available from January 12, does not need to be stored in such a way.

Minister Donnelly said vaccines could begin before the New Year. Picture: Julien Behal

Mr Donnelly said the IT systems required to roll out the vaccine will be in place.

He added that a vaccine certificate is part of the implementation plan, but the effectiveness of the vaccine at reducing the transmission of the disease will have to be looked at.

"What is not yet known by the regulator or by the producer is how effective is the vaccine at reducing transmissibility and really it is when we know that kind of information we'll be able to make informed judgments about how exactly a certificate could be used. 

"Certainly, I have heard the airlines floating the idea that for them they're looking at the potential for people needing vaccination certificates to fly," he said.

He added that "Ireland will not be found wanting in any way" and would be open to any requests it receives from the north for healthcare support, as cases of Covid continue to surge there.