Health Minister Stephen Donnelly casts doubt on Government Covid-19 vaccine commitments

Stephen Donnelly has cast new doubt on Government vaccine commitments saying his deadlines are “always conditional”.

Mr Donnelly said “we’re moving through them as quick as we can” in response to a question on whether summer jab targets were still on track.

The Minister for Health was speaking to reporters on the way into today's Cabinet meeting when he gave the latest disappointing update.

The Government has bravely committed to 80% of the country’s adults having jabs in their arms by the end of June.

But Mr Donnelly said that unfortunately this is completely reliant on vaccine deliveries in the coming months.

He predicts we will have one million doses delivered this month, and more than that again next month.

Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly at a press briefing on the update on the COVID-19 Vaccine Allocation Strategy at the Department of Health (Gareth Chaney/Collins)

One of the country’s leading Covid experts, Professor Sam McConkey, said earlier this week that it was more realistic to think of the end of September as a target for vaccinating the majority of the country’s adult population.

Vaccine supply chains have been hugely unreliable and unpredictable so far, with AstraZeneca being suspended last week, and only delivering a third of promised stocks for the first quarter of the year.

The HSE has also said that they have had to change their vaccine schedule from all suppliers at least 15 times so far this year.

Mr Donnelly said outside Government Buildings to waiting reporters this morning: “The target for us, as always, is to get the vaccines out as quickly as they arrive in.

“So any dates that have been given, they’re always conditional on us getting the vaccines in from the pharmaceutical companies.

“The HSE is getting over 95, or about 95% of the vaccines into people’s arms in about seven days.

“That’s what we’re going to continue to do.

“And there has been great progress made, in terms of the over 85s, now we’re down to the 80s, down to the over 75s and so forth, so it is moving at pace.

“More and more people are getting vaccinated.

“By my count there are around 700,000 doses of vaccine that have now been administered.

“We’ve a lot more coming in now towards the end of the month and into April.”

“We’re moving through them as quick as we can and we’re looking at the prioritisation.”