5% rate of people who have not attended for second vaccine dose - Dr Colm Henry

File photo dated 25/03/21 of a nurse preparing a Covid-19 vaccine. More than half of parents with children are willing to have them vaccinated against Covid-19 if jabs are offered to under-18s, a survey shows. Issue date: Sunday July 4, 2021.

The HSE’s chief clinical officer has said that there is a 5% rate of people who have not attended for their second vaccine dose.

Dr Colm Henry said that he would urge people to get their second vaccine, as it offered the best protection against the virus.

“We want to complete the (vaccination) programme.” 

The scientific evidence was that complete vaccination was the best protection, he said.

The uptake for the first dose had been 92%, while, to date, the uptake for the second dose was 68%. 

Dr Henry anticipated that the remaining people in the cohort who had not yet received their second dose would receive it by next Friday, July 16.

Speaking to RTÉ radio’s Today with Claire Byrne, Dr Henry acknowledged that the rise in the Delta variant was likely to lead to more pressure on the health system. 

In response to a call from emergency medicine consultant Dr Fergal Hickey for “alternative pathways” for people currently going to emergency departments, Dr Henry said that the HSE was trying to develop “loops” of care so people did not have to go to emergency departments. 

Dr Colm Henry. Picture: Sam Boal / Photocall Ireland

However, it would take time, he said.

Vaccination offered the best protection, it was a flood wall defence, but even the strongest flood wall could be breached if the water level was high enough, he said.

Dr Henry was fearful that the cessation of restrictions in the UK later this month would have an impact on Ireland. 

He quoted a letter from scientists in the Lancet medical publication which described the “abrupt cessation” of restrictions as “an unethical experiment.” 

I’m very fearful for us. We share a land border with the UK.

When asked about plans by vaccine manufacturer Pfizer to develop a booster vaccine (a third dose), Dr Henry said drug companies provided updated evidence all the time, but that it was up to each country to process that information. 

On the issue of travel, Dr Henry said that the Government would consider public health advice on the planned lifting of the international travel restriction on July 19.