Harris tells students to get life back with the jab

SIMON Harris and Tony Holohan have both urged young people who want to go clubbing to get vaccinated as it was revealed more than 150,000 are yet to be fully jabbed.

Higher Education Minister Mr Harris said that while almost 700,000 people aged between 16 and 29 are fully vaccinated, around 155,000 are not.

His comments came as the Chief Medical Officer described the number of young people who are unvaccinated as ‘a significant number’. In total, Dr Holohan said that 350,000 adults are unvaccinated. Speaking at yesterday’s NPHET briefing, Dr Holohan said: ‘That’s a big number of people who are young who are not yet vaccinated. Without a Covid pass, they shouldn’t be in bars, in restaurants, they shouldn’t be in nightclubs. ’

Dr Holohan called on young people to get the jab if they want to hit the dancefloor. He said: ‘There’s still an important opportunity for that large number of people... to come forward

‘Best thing is to get vaccinated’

and get vaccinated, to enable those people to partake in the kinds of opportunities that society will now have on offer for them.’

Meanwhile, Minister Harris said he was keen to see students enjoying a normal nightlife again. Speaking to reporters at Trinity College yesterday as he visited a pop-up vaccination centre, Mr Harris said Covid is ‘not going anywhere anytime soon’ so it was important that students could ‘get on’ with their lives..

‘The best thing they can do is get vaccinated, follow the public health advice, and then also try and live their life,’ he said. ‘And yes, that’s a little bit different to show your vaccine cert to get into a nightclub and you wear masks in certain scenarios, but you can also then get on with your life.’ Plea: Higher Education Minister Simon Harris