Update on #vaccine roll-out & advice on #vaccine use.

Since Thursday’s Government announcement about the re-opening of society and the easing of public health restrictions, I have had many queries about the vaccination programme. Therefore, I thought I’d share with you the latest position as recommended by NIAC (National Immunisation Advisory Committee) and adopted by Government in terms of the use of certain Covid-19 vaccines.

All EMA authorised COVID-19 vaccines, including Janssen and AstraZeneca, can be offered to those aged 50 years and older, including to individuals at very high or high risk of severe COVID-19 disease.

Pregnant women should be offered mRNA COVID-19 vaccination between 14-36 weeks gestation following an individual benefit/risk discussion with their obstetric care giver.

For those who have had a previous laboratory confirmed COVID-19 infection within 6 months:

• aged 50 years and older should receive a full COVID-19 vaccine schedule

• aged under 50 years and immunocompromised should receive a full COVID-19 vaccine schedule

• aged under 50 years and immunocompetent: a single dose of COVID-19 vaccine is sufficient and they should then be considered fully vaccinated.

The ultimate impact is that more vaccines will be available to more people, thus supporting the acceleration of the vaccine programme. As with other changes to the programme, the overall impact of these new parameters for the use of vaccines will be modelled and operationalised by the High-Level Taskforce and the HSE in the coming days.

Self-registration open for those aged 60-69 and plans for those aged 50-59

• The National Vaccination Programme has entered a new phase and we now asking people aged 60 to 69 to register for their COVID-19 vaccine on the HSE website. This includes everyone aged 60-69, including people aged 60-69 who have health conditions that put them at higher risk from COVID-19 or are healthcare workers not yet vaccinated.

• People in this group will be vaccinated at one of the HSE vaccination centres around the country using the AstraZeneca vaccine.

• This is in addition to the vaccination currently underway for other groups including finishing the small remaining dose 1s for the over 70s and progressing dose 2s, and vaccinating those aged 16 to 69 at very high risk of severe COVID-19 disease.

• Online registration remains open to allow all people age 60 to 69 to register anytime if they happen to miss their allocated day.

• Customer support and phone registration is available for people having difficulty with the online registration system. People can call HSELive on 1850 24 1850 to register over the phone.

• On Friday, it was confirmed that over the course of next week, the portal will open for registration to all those aged 50-59.

Do get in touch with me if you’ve any questions or queries arising from the information outlined above.