Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Gloster very much for his presentation and for all the staff being available here this morning.

I will open with the issue of long-term planning. I raised the matter yesterday at the private meeting about the winter plan for last year when we had significant challenges dealing with the flu. My understanding is that the Department has now requested HIQA to examine the roll-out of enhanced flu vaccination. When is the health technology assessment, HTA, report going to be available? We are competing on the world market for a lot of medication and I am concerned that there may be a delay in the production of this report. My understanding is that two analyses are being done: one for those aged 55 to 65 and the other one from age 65 up. When is the analysis going to be back and when will we have a decision about making sure that we have adequate supplies of the vaccine?