THE ONLINE portal for all parents to book their children in for Covid-19 vaccines will likely not open until January with kids set to receive the jab at mass vaccination centres, the Irish Sun can reveal.
It comes as the National Immunisation Advisory Committee today advised the Government that all children aged between five and 11 should receive the Covid-19 vaccine.
The latest figures from the HPSC show that there have been 13,483 cases of Covid-19 detected in children aged between five and 12 in the last two weeks – an age group that is almost entirely unvaccinated.
This primary school cohort makes up for almost 21 per cent of the cases detected in Ireland in the past fortnight – more than any other age group.
NIAC have advised that the vaccines should be prioritised for three cohorts of children before they are made available to all 480,000 children in this age group.
The priority cohorts are children with underlying health conditions, kids living with a younger child with complex medical needs or children living with an adult who is immunocompromised.
These groups will get the vaccines first with the first doses of the Pfizer kids jab due to arrive in Ireland next week, according to Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly.
The European Medicines Agency has already ruled that the vaccine is safe for children between five and 11 with the most common side effects pain at the injection site, tiredness or a headache.
Most read in The Irish Sun
The children’s vaccine from Pfizer is a two dose programme with a three week gap between jabs.
The HSE has already begun work on a comprehensive plan for the roll out of vaccines to children.
The Irish Sun understands that this plan will see some children in the priority groups receive the jab before Christmas however, the vast majority of kids will not get their vaccine until next year.
A source told the Irish Sun that the HSE’s online portal will likely open in January for all parents to book their children in for the jab.
MAJOR INFORMATION CAMPAIGN
We can also reveal that the HSE are considering using mass vaccination centres to roll out the jab for children with special time zones blocked off at the centres for kids.
The HSE are being extremely cautious in their planning for the roll out of the child vaccine and want to make sure that there is no risk that any child will receive the wrong vaccine.
The HSE is also working with the Department of Health on a major information programme on vaccines for children due to concerns that parents will be targeted by misinformation campaigns.
This information campaign will run alongside the roll out of the vaccines in a bid to provide all parents with full information about the jab.
OMICRON MAY NOT BE WORSE
It comes as the WHO revealed that initial data shows that the new Omicron variant is not more severe than previous strains with drug giant Pfizer claiming a third shot of their vaccine neutralises the new strain.
Pfizer and BioNTech said that blood from people who had their third dose a month ago fought off Omicron as effectively as a two dose regime fought off the original strain of the virus.
The WHO’s Dr Mike Ryan claimed that initial data shows that the Omicron strain may not be any worse than previous variants of Covid-19.
He said: “The preliminary data doesn’t indicate that this is more severe. In fact, if anything, the direction is towards less severity.”
However, the Irish expert confessed that more research was still needed to understand the full threat of Omicron.
‘BOOSTER NO SHOWS’
It comes as Taoiseach Micheal Martin was accused of blaming people for problems in the HSE’s vaccine system that is resulting in large numbers of people not turning up for booster vaccine appointments.
Earlier this week, the Taoiseach expressed concern in the Dail that there was a lack of urgency from people to get boosters as he claimed more than 200,000 appointments were left empty in the past two weeks as people didn’t show up.
However, a number of issues in the vaccine system have resulted in inflated ‘no show’ numbers including people being able to get their booster in a GP, pharmacy or vaccination centre.
Enormous queues outside vaccination centres have also been blamed for ‘no shows’ with some centres seeing queues as long as three hours.
Vaccine appointments are being sent out to people who have already got their third jab, who have recently been infected or do not qualify for the booster as it is too close to their second dose.
Social Democrats leader Catherine Martin told the Taoiseach: “Instead of blaming people for not turning up to their appointments, can you tell us what’s being done to resolve the problems with the booking system.”
In response, the Taoiseach back tracked and claimed he was not trying to blame the public but was attempting to underline the importance of getting a booster jab.
He told the Dail: “The HSE acknowledge that they do have to improve system but it’s more than that.
“In my conversations with all the principles yesterday there was a sense, to be frank about it, that the same urgency that applied to getting a first and second dose wasn’t quite there for the third dose.
“Not in any casting blame or anything like that, but just in urging everyone that the booster has very significant, positive impacts in strengthening your immune system against this disease and against new variants and ending up in hospital or in ICU.”