Two new vaccination centres are to open in Dublin as part of an acceleration of the Covid booster campaign.
Clinics will operate at Richmond Barracks and the RDS, while capacity at existing centres is being increased.
Vaccine centre opening times have been extended from 8am to 8pm and the 15 minute wait time has been waived to help GPs and pharmacists give more boosters a day.
Patients are being told to stay away from their GP for the next month, unless they have an urgent problem, to allow them to give boosters.
Doctors vaccinating their own patients will be allowed flexibility to give boosters to people from the age of 16 upwards but will prioritise older age groups.
700 pharmacies will be involved in the booster programme by the end of this week. But they're only allowed to give boosters to all adults over 50, not everyone over 16.
Darragh O'Loughlin, from the Irish Pharmacy Union, is calling for that rule to be changed;
"Given that we know that GPs will have a role vaccinating people all the way down to 16, it makes no sense that pharmacies wouldn't have an equivalent role."
NPHET meeting
It comes as NPHET will meet today with more restrictions on social mixing and close contacts expected.
The Health Minister has warned the Omicron wave could be worse than the peak of Delta. Stephen Donnelly said last night that modeling has predicted case numbers equal to last year, and that hospitalisations could surpass January’s figures.
Despite Omicron appearing to be less severe than Delta, it’s more infectious and could be the dominant strain here by next week.
Minister Donnelly qualified his comments by saying the vaccine levels and ramped up booster campaign provide more protection than was there at the start of 2021.
Reporting by Seán Defoe
