Dr. Tony Holohan:

It depends on what level the Deputy is talking about. There are potentially many different levels and I do not want to take up too much of her time. On the response to a new emergent variant, let us take the Omicron variant as an example. It was only a matter of a day or two from the international reports to the point at which we had a series of meetings over the course of a weekend, which culminated in measures that the Government agreed to put in place. In the first instance, they were focused on border measures and increasing the possibility of our testing systems and public health system to catch and control the spread of this variant when it arose. That response was very rapid. They are the kind of actions one will see again if there is an emerging variant and we will continue to keep a focus on that. We have that set of arrangements in place; watchful waiting in anticipation of and then mobilising based on that advice. I will not say that is easier to do but the contingency challenge at the other end of the spectrum is where the HSE has to figure how to respond to what might occur in the future in the footprint of the vaccination programme, putting in place a staffing and contractual set of arrangements to provide the facilities and the wherewithal to deliver those vaccines within short periods. That is a very complicated task based on the advice we will give and work on with the HSE. NPHET will be doing that work in the next period. I am just using vaccinations as an example.

We will apply exactly the same thinking to what will need to be in place in the future with regard to testing and contact tracing. We can ensure that we have something which is focused on what we think is proportional to what the disease is throwing at us, but is capable of responding much more rapidly than we might have been able to respond as a country. That is not a criticism of anybody, given that everything that we experienced was new. There was a need to provide enormous capacity for testing, tracing, surveillance and vaccination in short periods when that need arose. That work is ongoing at present. Some of it is in the Department and some is in the HSE.