Thank you, Mr Cameron, and good morning to you and your fellow committee members. I am grateful for the opportunity to update the committee on the progress of our national vaccination programme.
Scotland’s Covid-19 vaccination programme is delivering ahead of our expectations. That is thanks to the enormous efforts of our national and local vaccination teams, our local authority and third sector partners, the armed forces, and all those who have come forward for their jags. At the outset, I put on record my sincere thanks to each and every one of those people.
I want to update members, because constraints in vaccine supply will mean that, from this weekend, we will have to slow down delivery for a period. Let me explain that before we go further.
Our total receipt of doses to 7 February was around 196,000 less than expected and was therefore less than we had planned for in the deployment plan that we published in January. Alongside that, we have vaccinated around 75,000 more people than expected as a result of significant and very welcome take-up—of course, that side of the issue is good news, because it means that we have been getting the vaccine into more arms quickly.
Members will recall that Pfizer made clear publicly that its production would slow down so that it could be scaled up to meet global demand; therefore, the volume of supply for the UK is reduced for a limited period. If we take all that together and factor in the planned second doses, which will increase towards the end of February for Pfizer and in March for Oxford-AstraZeneca, we need to remodel our delivery to ensure that we carry enough supply to cover first doses and the increase in second doses.
We are on target to vaccinate 400,000 people this week, which is two weeks earlier than our commitment. However, to manage the reduced supply, from next week we will need to reduce the number of first doses to between 150,000 and 200,000 until supply increases, which we hope will be very soon. As I said, the supply issue affects the whole of the UK; it affects all four nations, and I continue to discuss it with my health secretary colleagues in the other countries. Of course, if supply increases sooner than we expect it to do, we will scale up. We have demonstrated that we have the infrastructure and the workforce to do just that.
My final point on that is that, notwithstanding the supply issues that I have set out, we will meet our target for the over-70s and the clinically extremely vulnerable by 15 February, and we will complete group 5 by the end of February/early March, as we said that we would do. We also still intend—supplies permitting—to be able to offer first doses to all JCVI priority groups by the end of May.
I would be happy to set out the detailed modelling and numbers, but members know that our colleagues in the UK Government have concerns about that, and that we are still to reach an agreement on which information can be published. People in Scotland are entitled to know about the vaccine that comes in and how quickly we are using it, and I intend to make that clear as soon as possible.
Given the focus of the meeting, I will provide an update on our progress in addressing vaccine hesitancy, particularly in ethnic minority communities. Finally, I will say a little about the global nature of the crisis and the global response that is required to meet it.
This week marks a significant milestone. The one millionth person in Scotland was vaccinated yesterday, which means that just over 22 per cent of the population has been vaccinated. The most recent figures show that 63,178 doses were administered yesterday, taking the total number of people vaccinated to 1,048,747. That means that we have vaccinated 99.9 per cent of elderly residents in care homes, 94 per cent of all care home residents, 97 per cent of those aged 80 and over in the community, 87 per cent of those aged 75 to 79 and 54 per cent of those aged 70 to 74.
That has not been achieved without problems. I always said that there would be problems in a programme of such complexity, particularly when the programme must deal with variation in the vaccine supply and is, as we have seen recently, subject to the unpredictability of our Scottish weather. We must respond to those problems and resolve them.
Our decision at the outset to prioritise vaccinating older care home residents and staff came at a cost in terms of the overall number of people vaccinated, but it was the right decision because it saved lives. By mid-February, once everyone over 70 and those with a serious clinical vulnerability have been vaccinated, we will have to start conserving supplies in order to begin offering second doses.
We know that vaccine-hesitant people tend to come from the black, black British, Pakistani and Bangladeshi groups, or are likely to be people who have lower incomes or live in areas of deprivation. A report that was published by the scientific advisory group for emergencies in December 2020 showed that willingness to take a Covid-19 vaccine is markedly lower among Pakistani people and black ethnic groups. We are working hard to mitigate vaccine hesitancy. The Scottish Government is working with community groups and faith leaders to promote vaccine confidence and increase uptake, and we fund a number of community programmes. That work will continue at pace. I had the opportunity to hear what those on the previous panel said about the issue, and I look forward to hearing members’ thoughts on it.
Finally, let me mention the importance of international co-operation. We are faced with an unprecedented global crisis that has left no country or people unaffected. It has emphasised the importance of our commitment to international solidarity and of working together on a shared challenge. It is essential to create conditions for equitable access to Covid-19 vaccines. That is why I am pleased that Scotland is part of COVAX, the international effort to reach out to other countries and act as good global citizens as we work together to find our way out of the pandemic.
As I am sure you heard from Grant Archibald, each health board is working hard to get the vaccine into people’s arms as quickly as possible and as soon as supplies arrive. Everyone who is eligible will be offered the vaccine as we work our way through the priority groups. That work relies on partnership and collaboration with individuals and communities at all levels, which I am sure will be a theme in our discussion. I am grateful to all our partners, including those from whom you have heard today, for their engagement and support. I look forward to continuing that work and to seeing this important national vaccination programme through to a successful conclusion.
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