This is the first look at the vaccine freezers that will house Ireland's doses of the life-saving jabs.
With the government now talking about initiating plans to roll out the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, the arrival of nine ultra-low temperature COVID-19 vaccine freezer trucks into the country is a very progressive step.
In order to increase the vaccine's chances of success, it needs to be stored at -70 degrees in specialised freezers.
Taoiseach Micheal Martin said the specialised containers are standing by in Citywest to deliver the jabs across the country.
Paul Reid, CEO of Health Service Executive, provided an update on the vaccine and the freezer trucks via his personal social media account.
"We're preparing for the COVID-19 vaccine roll out in Ireland," he said.
"At the HSE National Cold Chain Centre, we have received and are currently commissioning and validating a consignment of 9 x Ultra- Low-Temperature Freezers for storage of the vaccines at -75 degrees."
Speaking on RTÉ's Six One News, Minister for Health Stephen Donnely said that if the vaccine gets the green light from the EMA on December 29, Ireland will be in a position to start administering the drug to people in the first week of the New Year.
He said: “If, for example, the EMA authorise on the 29th of December, we would have a final authorisation here by the HPRA within days. What I’m told is that quite like the UK, the UK is taking seven to ten days from authorisation to distribution and the view is that Ireland would be about the same.
"We had the lowest COVID rate anywhere in the European Union right now and the biggest fall in Covid numbers anywhere in Europe and the biggest fall in COVID fatalities between wave one and wave two.
"And now we’re looking at more good news in terms of vaccines and it’s important to say that the focus today is on Pfizer because that’s the first one that the UK has gone with, but Ireland has signed up to six separate vaccines. We can’t have any situation where there would be any question of access being a problem because of affordability.”
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