Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We have updated advice now from NIAC which is recommending that we can go back to an eight-week interval between AstraZeneca doses. That is welcome news for healthcare workers and others - people in their 50s and 60s who have received AstraZeneca and would like to get fully vaccinated as soon as possible. We want them to be fully vaccinated as soon as possible. The recommendation from NIAC is in line with the European Medicines Agency, EMA, which says 56 days is a sufficient interval between doses, but not less.

What is happening now, over the next couple of days and over the weekend is that the HSE is working out if and how it can operationalise that. Supplies from AstraZeneca have been patchy, inadequate and unsatisfactory and we want to make sure we have enough doses to do that. The intention is to move in that direction and to get people who have had their first dose of AstraZeneca, AZ, getting their second dose as soon as possible.

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