Response from 18 – 34 year olds to Covid vaccine in pharmacies “phenomenal”

AN Ennis pharmacist has described the demand for the Covid-19 vaccine from 18 to 34 year olds as “phenomenal”. From Monday a number of pharmacies in Clare started administering Covid-19 vaccines to the 18-34 year old cohort as part of the national programme.
According to pharmacist Brendan Rochford of Rochford’s Pharmacies in Ennis and Corofin, “The announcement on Friday morning caught us completely by surprise. The phones started ringing non-stop from 9am last Friday.
“Our staff have been fantastic dealing with such a huge volume of enquiries.”
Rochford’s had already been administering vaccines to the over 50s age group but, according to Brendan the numbers were much smaller compared to the volume of enquiries they have received for the 18-34 yr old age group. 
“We have an online vaccine booking system on our website www.rochfordspharmacy.ie which is very efficient but we had to get this set up for the 18-34 year old age group so it was late on Friday before we got this done.
“We thank our patients for being so patient and understanding.”
While there has been a massive demand for the jab, the pharmacist is still awaiting details from the HSE on how many vaccines they will receive.
 “The interest has been phenomenal. However we are still waiting on confirmation on the number of vaccines we will be supplied with from the HSE.  We are delighted to be able to play our small part within our community.”
He assured that for those attending the pharmacy to receive their vaccine, the procedure is very efficient.
“We are administering the vaccine in our Parnell Street and Francis Street branches. We are lucky to have parking outside our door and clients are in and out very quickly. It’s a single shot Johnson & Johnson (Janssen) vaccine.
“Clients have to wait 15 minutes afterwards so they are in and out very quickly.”