Ireland will have vaccinated over half of the adult population by Tuesday, according to a leading medical expert in the country.
The news comes as pharmacies begin administered the 'one-shot' Johnson and Johnson vaccine to those aged between 18 and 34 from Monday morning.
As of July 3, 4,334,626 doses had been administered by doctors and nurses across the country.
That broke down into around 64% of the country having had at least one dose, and 46.8% being fully protected.
But Professor Brian MacCraith, the Chair of the High Level Task Force on COVID19 Vaccination, tweeted the positive news on Monday morning that within the next 24 hours, half the country will be fully protected.
He said "Vaccine update. By tomorrow, >50% of our adult population will be fully vaccinated. 4.4 million doses administered to date. 343k doses administered in the past week. 55k doses administered on each of the last four days. 103k AZ doses administered last week. Janssen for 18-34s starts today"
It comes on a major day for Ireland's reopening hopes.
Irish pubs and restaurants are aiming to reopen fully on July 19 ahead of crunch government talks.
Industry bosses are due to meet with officials on Monday to discuss the return of indoor dining.
Antigen testing and vaccine passes will also be on the agenda at the vital discussions today.
And Adrian Cummins, CEO of Restaurants Association of Ireland, said that members of the hospitality sector are "working towards" July 19 as the latest reopening date.
He told Morning Ireland on RTE Radio One: "We're working towards July 19, the government hasn't announced that that is off the table, that is the first point we will be raising with the government this afternoon: What date are we working towards, how are we going to get there and what systems are we going to put in place.
