First Minister points to new vaccine timetable as “most difficult cases in English hotspots” are “unvaccinated people in their 20s”

The First Minister has indicated Monday should see a ‘a timetable for completing the offer of a first dose of the vaccine to all adults here in Wales’ set out.

So far 2,169,624 people in Wales have  had their first dose of the coronavirus vaccine and 1,181,259 people are now fully vaccinated.

The Welsh Government’s current aim is to offer all eligible adults a first dose of a coronavirus vaccine by the end of next month.

Current levels of coronavirus in Wales are low, with fewer than 10 cases per 100,000 people in the rolling seven day average and a positivity rate less than 1%.

At the time of writing there have been no new recorded deaths by Public Health Wales in the last nine days.

However speaking yesterday First Minister said there is concern about the increase in rates of the Indian variant – now formally called the Delta variant.

He said: The Delta variant is spreading in many parts of England, “despite the restrictions in place there.

“Today there are more than 10,700 confirmed cases in England, largely linked to eight areas of the country, and mainly in the North west.

“If that pattern continues, it’s important to say to everyone today that we will not be immune from that here in Wales.

“Already we have 97 identified cases in Wales, and we know that they will be more than that.“Everyone has been traced and advised to isolate, their contacts have been contacted too.”

“This includes a large cluster in Conwy and we keep that large cluster under very close investigation.”

On Thursday Public Health England released two documents based off data from England and Scotland, a Technical Briefing on B.1.617.2/Delta and a B.1.617.2/Delta risk assessment.

The early data indicates a reduced vaccine effectiveness for Delta compared to Alpha: “This is more pronounced after one dose (absolute reduction in vaccine effectiveness against symptomatic infection of approximately 15-20% after 1 dose).

“Iterated analysis continues to show vaccine effectiveness against Delta is higher after 2 doses but that there is a reduction for Delta compared to Alpha.”

With a second dose appearing more required against Delta we asked the first minister on the topic, if there was any policy adjustments to make sure that vulnerable people are covered with double dose as soon as possible and if there was any plans to move forward second doses for everybody else.

The first minister said: “You are right that the second dose of the vaccine does offer you a higher protection against the new variant. But, a first dose is very important as well.

“It’s particularly important amongst younger people who, some of the most difficult cases that they have seen across our border in English hotspots have been people in their 20s not vaccinated at all.

“Now, I hope on Monday to be able to set out a timetable for completing the offer of a first dose of the vaccine to all adults here in Wales and also to set out a path for how we will get a second doses of vaccination.

“We’ve already got 45% of the Welsh population with both doses of the vaccine and that’s going up every day.

“When we’ve completed the first dose of all adults, we will be able to use all the capacity that we have for second doses, and that will accelerate second doses here as well.”

“The supply is a rate limiting factor, of course, we use every drop of supply that we get to get it into people’s arms as fast as possible. Local health boards already have flexibility to speed up second doses in areas where they think that would be a sensible part of the response to local clusters of the Delta variant area.”

“But the big picture will be when we are able to get first doses to everybody and then move on to complete second doses. As I say, I hope to be able to set out more definitive timetable for that once we’ve seen the figures and today and over the weekend.”

The first minister is expected to provide a vaccine update at a press conference on Monday.