Covid-19 vaccinations for children aged five to 11 will begin on Monday, inaugurating a massive inoculation exercise for more than 300,000 children that will be carried out across 15 paediatric centres and rolled out in batches.

This is an important step forward in the national vaccination programme, which has already resulted in 96 per cent of the eligible population having been fully vaccinated. Vaccinating younger children now will help to protect them, their families and the wider community at a time when the Omicron variant of the coronavirus is spreading globally.