David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing time with my colleague, Deputy Ward.

We are at a very important point in the battle against Covid. In fact, I would argue we are at a critical point in relation to suppressing this virus. We have had debates in this Chamber on a range of different ingredients to keep driving down community transmission and then keeping the numbers low. That includes having a first-class test and trace system. It obviously includes sufficient checks and controls at ports and airports. As the Minister and the Minister of State are aware, we have disagreements in those areas. The roll-out of the vaccine must be front and centre. Everybody in this State wants that process to be a success because it is a route out of the crisis we are in and it gives people hope that we will have some level of normality back in our lives in the next number of months.

However, it must be said that there are problems. It is our job to raise those problems with the Minister. Those problems are not only on the supply side but there have been some problems on the supply side. We are hearing that some countries, such as Denmark, Hungary and Austria, are ahead of us in vaccinating their population. Those countries have hit a target of 9%. We are on 6%. There are reports of some countries going outside of the EU procurement process and doing side deals and additional deals with pharmaceutical companies, and yet there is no sense that there are any additional vaccines coming our way in this State.

There were issues last week. Much of the evidence was anecdotal, but I spoke to many GPs who did not receive their vaccines on time. It was right across the State. County Monaghan, in particular, was bad, but there were many examples. I dealt directly with GPs and with the HSE in trying to resolve the problem. That was problematic. It showed, if there are problems at that level when we are only rolling it out for the over 85s, what will happen when we get to the general population roll-out. There are problems and I will get to some of those in a moment.

There are also issues in relation to transparency and daily reporting. We are still not getting sufficient information to give us confidence that there is absolute transparency about the number of vaccines in the country, the number of people vaccinated and the number of vaccines which are in storage on a daily or weekly basis. The absence of that information and transparency is problematic. We have mixed targets. We saw this week where targets were not met. We also have some groups, such as carers, who are not defined as a distinct cohort. These are all real problems that have been raised with us on a daily basis.

I have a number of questions for the Minister. The first relates to the procurement side of this matter. Many EU states have now gone outside of the current EU procurement process. Can the Minister confirm that has happened and can he state why we are not looking to increase supply as well? If other countries are able to do it, why is it not possible for this State to be able to do it? I want solidarity across the European Union. I want global solidarity but when people watch other member states going outside of the process, including Germany, they are asking reasonable questions. What is the Irish Government doing? What is Deputy Stephen Donnelly, as Minister for Health, doing? Is the Minister being proactive enough in ensuring that we maximise the supply side of the vaccine? As a first question, I put that to the Minister. Is it the case that other member states have gone outside of the process? Is that allowed and if it is, what are we doing about it in terms of increasing the supply side for this State?

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