Mr. Fintan Hourihan:

I am pleased that at this stage the majority of dentists and their staff have been vaccinated. It took a huge amount of work. Legislation, by way of statutory instrument, was passed which allows dentists to participate as vaccinators. CPL Healthcare, the agency handling the recruitment of vaccinators, has indicated that approximately 130 dentists have applied to join as vaccinators. There are approximately 3,000 active dentists in practice. The majority, 90% plus, would be in private practice. The HSE has said it does not envisage that persons would be vaccinated in dental clinics. It is obviously envisaging that it will take place in either medical GP surgeries, pharmacies or in the large scale HSE clinics.

We expect some public dental service dentists will be redeployed for vaccination purposes. The first requests have gone to staff in certain parts of the country. Part of the problem is that it has been documented that there were difficulties with the application process. I cannot say we have had large numbers of people saying that they have not volunteered because of the application process. So far 130 private dentists, which would presumably include retired dentists, have applied. We appreciate that dentists have practices to run.

On the basis that they would be participating in the vaccination process at locations elsewhere, many of them have said that they would be interested in working on Saturdays or Sundays if it becomes a seven-day operation. So far, the take-up has been quite low. We presume that is because, as has been said, dentists are very busy with their practices.