Maria Byrne (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I will start by wishing everyone here, all our colleagues in this House and in the other House, the Acting Leader, the Cathaoirleach and his office, Mr. Martin Groves and his office and all of the staff from the ushers to the people working in the various different sections throughout the building, a very happy and safe Christmas.

The main issue I wish to raise today is a mistake made during the week whereby pharmacists received an email from the HSE stating they could start giving out vaccines boosters to people from the age of 16 upwards who are in the cohort that has been approved, and to pregnant women and people in their 40s. Many people made their appointments in the pharmacies. Now it has been said that that was a mistake and that they cannot do this. We are trying to get the boosters into people as quickly as possible. I know that only 400 pharmacies were doing it initially and there are now over 700. This is a way of getting boosters into people as quickly as possible. The National Public Health Emergency Team, NPHET, is meeting today and there are concerns about the Omicron variant. We should allow the pharmacies to give these vaccines to people because I got my booster vaccine in a walk-in pharmacy last week and it was run very efficiently.People moved through it very quickly. I compliment all the staff involved in giving out vaccines.

Last but not least, Christmas is coming. Like Senator Dolan, I have not done my Christmas shopping but I encourage everybody to buy local and support local because the small businesses in our local communities have suffered so much and it is really important to support these businesses across all sectors.