Covid Scotland: Nicola Sturgeon faces fury as vaccine rollout slows

Nicola Sturgeon was scrambling to contain a vaccines crisis in Scotland tonight after the country’s jab rollout slumped to a new daily low.

Just 9,628 patients received their first vaccine dose yesterday, the fewest since the Scottish Government began publishing figures on January 11.

Scotland is lagging behind the rest of the country, as Government data revealed another 322,000 vaccines were dished out across the country on Sunday. 

Scotland currently has the lowest rate of vaccine coverage of any of the four UK nations, with 575,987 doses administered to date – around six per cent of the 9.3million first doses handed out across Britain.

The disappointing figures come as Ms Sturgeon prepares to introduce a tough new quarantine for international arrivals to Scotland that goes further than Boris Johnson‘s in England.

Facing the media today Ms Sturgeon admitted vaccination numbers were ‘simply falling off a bit on a Sunday’ but did not give any further explanation.  

Just 9,628 patients received their first vaccine dose yesterday, the fewest since the Scottish Government began publishing figures on January 11

Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said: ‘The SNP’s slow Covid vaccine rollout is lagging miles behind the rest of the UK. They’re letting Scotland down at the biggest challenge facing us’

She insisted the programme was ‘ahead of schedule’ to give vaccines to all over-80s by Friday, with 80 per cent of their first doses administered so far. In care homes, 98 per cent of residents and 88 per cent of staff have now received a dose of the vaccine.

But Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said: ‘Today’s daily vaccination figures are the lowest yet. 

‘The SNP’s slow Covid vaccine rollout is lagging miles behind the rest of the UK. They’re letting Scotland down at the biggest challenge facing us.’

It comes as Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced just shy of a million people received a jab across Britain over the weekend.

Mr Hancock said those who had received a first dose of the life-saving drug included more than half of the over-70s, plus nine in 10 of the over-80s. 

Britain today recorded the fewest daily coronavirus deaths since December, with 406 more victims as the second wave continues to decline.

Department of Health figures also show cases are continuing to fall, hitting a seven-week low of 18,607 positive tests. 

Mr Hancock said that the UK has now ordered another 40 million vaccine doses from Valneva, adding that the UK is continuing with its ‘no regrets’ attitude to backing vaccines that have yet to be approved. 

He said that if it gains approval, the Valneva vaccine will be manufactured in Livingston in Scotland.

Fronting the Downing Street press conference tonight Mr Hancock said: ‘We have visited every single care home with older residents in England and offered vaccinations to all of their residents and staff – this has been an incredible example of health and social care working together.’

Facing questions about why Scotland appeared to be rolling out its vaccination programme at a slower pace than across the rest of the UK, Ms Sturgeon said: ‘There’s a long way to go in this programme and it’s really important we do it methodically, sustainably – concentrating on the most vulnerable first.

‘That’s what we have been doing and I think as we go through this week we will see further evidence that is what is happening.’

She also claimed the Government had ‘adapted our estimates’ since the Health Secretary said a million people could be vaccinated by the end of January, but it was ‘firmly on track’ with the revised targets for over-70s and the most clinically vulnerable.

Scotland has entered the second phase of its plan to give the population a vaccine to combat coronavirus with two new mass vaccination centres opening on Monday.

The facilities at Aberdeen’s P&J Live venue and the Edinburgh International Conference Centre (EICC) will be able to inoculate an extra 27,000 people per week.

NHS staff spent last week vaccinating each other as part of their inductions at the centres.

Ms Sturgeon will tomorrow outline Scotland’s new quarantine plan, which goes further than Boris Johnson’s hotel quarantine for arrivals from ‘red list’ states with high levels of Covid-19 

She said today that Scotland had to ‘be ever more vigilant in trying to stop the virus coming into the country’.

‘To reduce the risk of the virus entering the country, as you know, we have already agreed with other countries across the UK to introduce supervised quarantine from some countries,’ she said.

‘However, as I said last week, in our view the current UK-wide proposals don’t go far enough so tomorrow we will provide some more information about the extent to which we intend to operate supervised quarantine here in Scotland.

‘We will also set out some additional measures we are working on to make current travel restrictions more effective than they are already.’