Further delays to healthcare workers' vaccine roll-out

The HSE is still confident the majority of over-85s will receive their vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna. Picture: Gerard McCarthy 

The vaccination roll-out among healthcare workers may be delayed for the second week running due to changes to AstraZeneca's delivery schedule. 

100,000 doses of all vaccines should have been delivered by Sunday, February 28, but Monday's figures showed 81,843 instead.

The reduction of 18,157 affects frontline healthcare workers.

However, the HSE is still confident the majority of over-85s will receive their vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

Professor Brian MacCraith, head of the Vaccine Taskforce, told RTÉ that AstraZeneca alerted them late last week to pending reductions across two deliveries.

Vaccination roll-out among healthcare workers may be delayed for the second week running due to changes to AstraZeneca's delivery schedule. Picture: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews.ie

A HSE spokeswoman said this will be made up during March, and involves a temporary reduction of 25,000 doses.

But there are also glitches in the over-85s roll-out.

A plan to use the National Ambulance Service to deliver vaccines to bed-bound patients at home is not yet finalised, a spokeswoman said.

The Irish Medical Organisation previously said there could be “one or two” such patients in each of the 1,373 GP practices.

Up to 40 small GP practices are still in search of a “buddy-up” deal with another practice. Doctors in Cork, Limerick, Kerry, Monaghan, Dublin and Donegal have shared their frustrations on social media.

Minutes from a Nphet meeting in late January, published on Wednesday, note among older people “there is an appetite for ‘when’ and ‘where’ information regarding their vaccination”. 

The meeting also discussed the concerning impact of variants. They discussed asking people arriving in Ireland to give samples for analysis through whole-genome sequencing.

Contact tracing would then be enhanced for this group. A proposal was made to develop a national SARS-CoV-2 surveillance and whole genome sequencing programme.

The minutes show in late January all counties had a positivity rate higher than 10%, even when outbreaks were removed from the equation.

The World Health Organization recommends positivity stay below 5% for two weeks before changes to lockdowns.

Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr Ronan Glynn warned in a newly-published letter to the Health Minister: 'Ireland continues to experience a very concerning and fragile epidemiological situation.'

The news comes as unpublished data from the Health Protection Surveillance Centre shows 73% of Covid cases in January had no underlying conditions, up from 58% in December.

And Deputy Chief Medical Officer Ronan Glynn warned in a newly-published letter to the Health Minister: “Ireland continues to experience a very concerning and fragile epidemiological situation.”

The letter, sent by Dr Glynn to Mr Donnelly on February 25, notes 20 counties with a 10% positivity rate.

In reaction to this he recommended increased use of medical face masks. He said they should be worn by “vulnerable, high-risk and very high-risk cohorts, and older age groups when in crowded outdoor spaces or confined indoor community spaces”. 

The letter said 250 of the 637 deaths to that date in February were in nursing homes and 77 in hospitals.

Meanwhile cancer patients and oncologists still do not know when vaccinations for these patients will start. Four hundred and twenty-two cancer patients have died with confirmed Covid-19.

Head of research for the Irish Cancer Society Dr Robert O’ Connor said: “There is still a lot of uncertainty. Covid has a very stark impact on the cancer community.” 

On Wednesday, 25 deaths were notified and 566 cases confirmed by Nphet. Hospital numbers continued to decline to 489, with 114 in ICU.