SCOTLAND’S Covid vaccination programme reached a landmark yesterday, with half the population now having received the first dose of the vaccine.
A total of 2,733,387 people have received their first jag to protect against the virus, according to the latest Scottish Government figures, with the country’s population around 5.4 million.
It marks an increase of 11,303 from the previous day while 715,714 people have had both doses, with this figure up by 26,953 from Friday’s total.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who herself received a first dose of AstraZeneca on Thursday, paid tribute to those involved in the vaccination programme. She said: “This shows the phenomenal progress being made by Scotland’s vaccination programme.
“We have met our targets to offer first doses to all nine priority groups, those most at risk from Covid, by the middle of April and are well into the delivery of second doses to those groups.
“I want to pay a huge tribute to everyone who has contributed to the success of this programme, from the scientists and those who volunteered for clinical trials to the volunteer vaccinators and of course the 2.7 million people across Scotland who have rolled up their sleeves.”
The latest figures, published yesterday, also show Scotland recorded two more deaths and a further 210 cases of the virus. Just 1.2% of tests for Covid-19 came back as positive in the past 24 hours.
Meanwhile, there were 109 people in hospital on Friday who had recently been confirmed as having coronavirus – down six from the previous day’s total. However, the number of patients requiring intensive care had increased by two, to 18.
A total of 7642 people in Scotland have now died within 28 days of testing positive for the disease.
Scotland’s national clinical director Professor Jason Leitch yesterday said caution was still required, but added: “The numbers have continued to go downwards, even with the recent relaxations a few weeks ago. So we are very encouraged.”
He highlighted thresholds from the World Health Organisation which suggest cases have to be below 50 per 100,000 population for releasing lockdown and then below 20 for the virus to be under control.
“Scotland-wide it is now 34. There are only five [areas] above 50. So I think you can be hopeful,” he added.
Meanwhile a key figure on the UK’s immunisation committee said imported coronavirus variants are unlikely to set lockdown easing back to “square one” because immunity from vaccines “won’t just disappear”.
Professor Adam Finn, a member of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, said he expected a “gradual erosion” of vaccine protection as the virus evolves but not enough to “scupper” the road map out of lockdown, as one leading scientist had predicted.
On Friday, Imperial College’s Professor Danny Altmann said “we should be terribly concerned” after 77 cases of a potentially vaccine-busting Covid-19 mutation first discovered in India were identified in Britain, warning they could lead to a third wave of the virus.
But Finn said: “We’ve all expected evolution of this virus to occur from the start.
“I also think that we know from other viruses and previous experience that the immunity that vaccines give won’t just disappear.”
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