Humza Yousaf has written to the UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock asking him to take urgent action over "tight" Pfizer jab supplies in Scotland.
The new Scottish Health Secretary said some "outstanding" work has been carried out across the UK in delivering the vaccine programme since it got under way just over six months ago.
However, he said the recent decision by the JCVI (Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation) to use the Oxford Astrazeneca jab for only over 40s was hindering the race to vaccinate the entire adult population by the end of July.
Yousaf said the four nations of the UK must do "everything in our power to accelerate our efforts to vaccinate as many people as possible".
Ahead of a four-nation call on Thursday, Yousaf said Scotland needs more Pfizer doses if it is to "maintain or increase" the rollout. under 40.
In his letter, he highlighted how more than 75% of over-18s have now had a first dose, with more than half the adult population fully vaccinated.
He praised the "tireless work of all involved" in the rollout and thanked the UK Vaccines Taskforce for securing supplies, acknowledging it is "working incredibly hard to maximise volumes of all supply, including Pfizer".
Yousaf wrote: "I appreciate we are all doing what we can in this regard, but I am conscious that the recent changes by JCVI on the role of AstraZeneca, have placed increased pressure on our supply of Pfizer in particular.
"The latest forecast on supply would indicate that Pfizer will be particularly tight over the next few weeks and as a consequence the programme won’t be able to accelerate as much as I would wish.
"I know that the Vaccines Taskforce and colleagues in BEIS are working incredibly hard to maximise volumes of all supply including Pfizer.
"Notwithstanding this, I would be grateful to discuss what more could be done to further increase the available supply in the coming weeks to support efforts to deliver the programme at pace.
"I would of course be happy to discuss this at our next 4 nations Ministerial call if that would be useful."
