Mr. David Walsh:

I am joined today by my colleagues, Dr. Lucy Jessop, director of public health in the HSE's national immunisation office, and Mr. Fran Thompson, the HSE's chief information officer. Since the committee has my written statement, I will not go through all of it.

Vaccines are highly regulated products and the systems and processes put in place to distribute, administer and record their roll-out reflect this. As Mr. Goodman alluded, each vaccine is considered by the EMA, which then issues a conditional marketing authorization, CMA. This information is considered in Ireland by the national immunisation advisory committee, NIAC, which makes recommendations on the use of the vaccines to the Department of Health. The HSE is then asked to implement those recommendations.

The Pfizer vaccine comes in multi-dose vials with specific time constraints and cold chain storage conditions.

The national immunisation advisory committee provides the scientific and other advice regarding the management of the vaccine and this advice is updated regularly as more evidence emerges both locally and internationally about the vaccine. Each change in advice is rapidly acted on and updated guidance is issued to vaccinators.

The national immunisation office, NIO, leads on vaccine supply and distribution. In addition, the NIO develops and delivers training programmes for already experienced vaccinators via a range of channels including live webinars and the HSE's training portal, HSELanD. The NIO produces training and information material and distributes that material as well as providing ongoing support to the process.

Digital enablement of the programme is vital to its success. The vision is to have a fully digitally supported process from end to end covering all aspects of the vaccine programme. This is a challenging programme given the scope and timeframe for the roll-out. We are attempting to deliver a national digital programme, which would normally take approximately six months, within three weeks.

The three main processes that must be digitally enabled to have a successful overall offering include the pre-vaccination process, with a citizen registration portal to enable registration, scheduling and consent. Another is vaccine administration, including validation of citizens' identity, clinical workflow, recording of the vaccine, recording of adverse reactions, scheduling follow-up appointments and the production of a vaccine certificate. Another process is reporting and monitoring, which is critical and includes reporting and management of data, adverse reaction tracking etc. This delivery of the system and functionality is being undertaken in stages utilising an agile methodology. The process involves constant collaboration with the stakeholders and continuous improvement and iteration at every stage of the project. Integration of the individual health identifier, IHI, is critical to enable the HSE to safely administer the vaccine. IHI integration is now live on the system.

The core element for records about the vaccine has been operational since 29 December 2020. The system is operational across 680 healthcare facilities and is being used by 3,600 healthcare staff who are licensed users of the system. The general practitioner element of the portal is now live, which allows GPs to register to receive the Covid-19 vaccine. Once a person presents for vaccination, he or she is validated by an administrative staff member and then the person who is administering the vaccine records the details of the vaccination. The data are stored on the Salesforce system.

Progress to date includes integration of the system to the HSE service directory entries for more than 2,500 facilities including healthcare sites and new clinic locations. IHI integration is available, enabling access to real-time GP tables, professional ID validation and Eircode validation. The teams are working towards integration with GP systems to receive vaccine records. By Wednesday, 27 January, the HSE had administered a total of 161,500 vaccines across a variety of settings including long-term care and healthcare workers. The HSE will continue to roll out the vaccine programme in line with the Government strategy over the coming months in line with vaccine supply. The HSE works in an integrated way with the high-level task force on Covid-19 vaccination, as Professor MacCraith stated, and colleagues in the Department of Health, other Departments and a range of State, voluntary and private agencies to ensure that this programme is successfully delivered.