Irish Examiner view: Why is vaccine approval taking so long?

If we do not step up, it will take three years to immunise the whole population

The question that needs to be addressed is why it will take a month longer for this vaccine to be approved in the EU than it did in the UK. File picture: Danny Lawson/PA Wire

Since the start of the national Covid-19 vaccine programme three weeks ago, almost 140,000 people have received the first dose of immunisation, most of them vulnerable elderly people in care homes along with those on the frontline of health care.

That sounds impressive, but it is nowhere near the level we should be at if we are to vaccinate almost 5m people as a matter of extreme urgency.