Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 03 December 2020
As I said at the outset, the UK Government has secured 800,000 doses, and our 8.2 per cent share of that is 65,600 doses. That is what we are assured will be delivered. I cannot give other numbers, because we do not have definite delivery dates for the rest of December, so it is not possible for me to answer the second part of Ms Hamilton’s question.
I am happy to ensure that members are advised of information on the supply and the likely delivery dates as we get it. Doses will be distributed between our health boards according to population share, so that access is equitable. We have, for example, a breakdown of the number of care home residents in each of our health board areas, so we know what we need to distribute to those boards so that they can vaccinate all their care home residents. We have similar distribution allocation numbers for health and social care workers, and, indeed, for various age groups.
However, we need to remember that we are strongly advised by the MHRA—in fact, it is a requirement—to keep 50 per cent of all doses that we receive, in order to vaccinate for a second time those who receive the first vaccination. I understand that members are looking for definite numbers, but giving those numbers is not always as straightforward as one might think. We will do our very best to make sure that members have as much confirmed information that they can rely on as possible, as quickly as we can give it to them.