Dr. Ronan Glynn:

I thank the Senator. On the first point, there is a real risk that premature complacency will set in over these weeks as people, very understandably, see hope on the horizon but, as I said previously, unfortunately, a vaccine simply will not come soon enough to have any positive effect at a population level. As soon as it is rolled out, it will have a wonderful beneficial protective effective for the individuals who get it in the first instance but we are looking at a number of months before we see a vaccine having a significant effect on how we manage this disease overall in Ireland. Unfortunately, our messaging will not be changing any time soon. Whether a vaccine comes next week, the week after or the week after that, the reality is that, unfortunately, for the next number of months we will ask people to continue with all of the basic measures that have been so important over the past year and to which people have been so good at adhering.

On the Senator's second point, the situation in Northern Ireland is of real concern. NPHET will meet tomorrow and will consider both that situation and the situation internationally. The situation internationally over the past number of weeks can only be described as devastating when we look at the number of people in intensive care across Europe and the number of deaths and hospitalisations. NPHET's primary concern is the situation here in Ireland and while we have avoided to a large extent what has happened internationally over recent weeks, I emphasise again that our situation is very fragile. We have seen numbers tick up in recent days and the indicators are that, unfortunately, we have bottomed out in terms of it being as good as it was going to get and are beginning to see a deterioration once again. NPHET will be considering all of that tomorrow. We have ongoing and very regular engagement with colleagues in Northern Ireland and that will continue over the coming days.