J&J vaccine 'clarity' needed before decision on widening gap between doses

Dr Ronan Glynn: Nphet has not provided any updated advice. Picture: Julien Behal

No recommendations on extending the interval between Covid vaccine doses will be made until further clarity on the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is provided, the deputy chief medical officer has said.

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has asked health experts to look into extending the gap between jabs in order to vaccinate a greater number of people with a first dose in a shorter timeframe.

Mr Donnelly has suggested that the interval could be extended to eight weeks, and possibly to 12 weeks.

However, Dr Ronan Glynn, the deputy chief medical officer, has said Nphet has not provided any updated advice and "there is no point" in doing so at the moment.

"Any advice that we would provide, or any recommendations that either ourselves or Niac (National Immunisation Advisory Committee) would make in relation to this would need to take into account the impact on the programme," he said.

Dr Glynn said health experts would not be able to gauge the impact on the programme until the European Medicines Agency (EMA) come back with updated advice in relation to the one-shot Johnson & Johnson later this week.

Ireland currently has 14,000 doses of this vaccine in the HSE cold storage facility, however, no European country has yet administered this vaccine after concerns around extremely rare blood clots were raised in the US.

The EMA announced a review following the reporting of four cases of unusual thromboembolic events with low blood platelets, one during a clinical trial and three during the American rollout.

The Department of Health also sent a note to ministers yesterday afternoon confirming that any decision on extending the time between doses would be put off until after the EMA ruling.

Dr Glynn said: "We need to wait to see what the EMA say on that, decide what our approach to that vaccine will be in this country, incorporate that into our planning for the rollout of the vaccination programme more broadly and then decide over and above that there's a need to extend out the dosing interval for the MRNA vaccines."

Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe said the key thing is to have an effective vaccination strategy, but said that the Government is expecting further direction on the matter later in the week.

"Dr Ronan Glynn and his team are examining it at the moment, effective vaccinations is the key thing within our country, we're on track to do that and our vaccination strategy is working.

"We have evidence of what is happening in UK, Israel and America in relation to the aftermath of receiving the first dose. However, there are questions over the duration of vaccination dividend, and also questions we need to tease out regarding what impact this will have on how long we have to run our vaccination programme over the coming months."

Mr Donohoe added: "What I want is scale, that is now happening, it will build, and I look forward to Ronan and his team advising the Government on this decision, later in the week.

"We have our public health experts evaluating this, we will conclude through our public health doctors this week and that will allow us to continue with the strong progress we're making in vaccinations."