It will be "extremely difficult" to identify specific children within the five to 11 year old group to be prioritised for the cohort's first Covid-19 vaccines, HSE chief executive Paul Reid has said.
The HSE said it had been "working around the clock" to put in place a plan for these latest vaccinations since receiving recommendations on Tuesday from the National Immunisation Advisory Committee (Niac) approving the rollout of the Pfizer jab to all children in the age group.
Niac has strongly recommended that vaccines should be prioritised for children with an underlying health condition along with healthy children who are living with a younger child with complex medical needs or with an adult whose immune system is compromised.
Dr Colm Henry, the HSE's chief clinical officer, said Niac had provided "complicated" and "very nuanced" advice as it was not just dealing with an age group, but also healthy individuals who were living with others with medical conditions or weakened immune systems.
He said health officials were looking at how they could translate the advice “into something simple and effective with what is quite a complicated message so that parents can make the right decision for their children”.
There are an estimated 480,000 children aged between five and 11 but the HSE has pointed to the challenge of identifying the subgroup within that age cohort that needs to be prioritised.
“We know it is going to be extremely difficult to identify those that Niac have highly recommended in the five to 11 year olds,” Mr Reid told the weekly HSE Covid-19 press briefing.
The HSE wanted to manage the rollout of the vaccination programme to this younger age group and did not want to “compromise the speed and pace” of the overall vaccine rollout, he said.
“We know we need some dedicated centres for it.”
On the complications of the booster programme, Mr Reid said the HSE was dealing with a “very different operating model” than the primary vaccine rollout earlier this year.
Primary vaccines were administered through specific channels for specific age groups in descending order of age, year by year, while the HSE was managing the booster programme through vaccination centres, GPs and pharmacies in blocks of 10 years at a time.
‘Enthusiasm’
Mr Reid said the fact that more than 1.1 million booster doses had been administered showed that the “enthusiasm” for the programme had continued, but that vaccination centres and GPs had not seen the same rate of “take-up” as during the initial phase of vaccinations.
He said there was no single factor behind this but that the availability of boosters from different sources and “high demands” coming up to Christmas may be factors. “People are busy. They are back at work. They may be putting the appointment off.”
He stressed that neither the Taoiseach nor the HSE were setting out to blame anyone when they had pointed out the high number of booster appointments not being taken up. He acknowledged there were problems with cancelling appointments and people receiving multiple appointments.
HSE national lead for vaccinations Damien McCallion said 1,000-2,000 vaccinators were working full- and part-time and more were being recruited. The aim was to increase capacity to administer 200,000 doses a week by January through vaccination centres, up from 160,000 at present. He added that capacity was not an issue as the HSE administered 217,000 doses through vaccination centres, GPs and pharmacies last week.
