WATCH: NHS Lothian launches mass coronavirus vaccination centres

Patients are steadily flowing into NHS Lothian's mass COVID vaccination centres which opened on Monday moring.

The health board started its second stage of delivering coronavirus vaccines to the region's 64-69-year-olds.

The most vulnerable among them - aged 75-79 are being invited to their nearby GP surgeries to receive their injection locally.

But people between the ages of 65 and 74 are attending appointments at large-scale and smaller community venues.

The first of the sites to go live earlier were the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, and the Strathbrock Partnership Centre in Broxburn.

A total team of over 500-volunteer vaccinators has been created to work in the mass vaccination sites, and they're being supported by around 100 administrative staff.

The EICC is capable of vaccinating more than 21,000 people a week through 45-stations, while Strathbrock has six stations, capable of vaccinating 2352 people every week.

The West Lothian centre will then move to Pyramids Business Park on February 15th, which will provide 14,280 vaccinations every week at 34-stations.

The aim is to protect 70 to 79s, and the clinically extremely vulnerable - including over-16s on the shielding list - by mid-February.

Figures show 80-per-cent of those in Scotland who are aged over 80 have now had their first of two doses, as well as 98-per-cent of care home residents across the country.

Margaret Swift, 69, from the Balgreen area of the Scottish capital was one of the first through the EICC's doors.

She was among around 1700-people on the venue's first day of operations.

The retired care worker came close to cancelling her appointment after spending almost a year staying in. She told Radio Forth News: "I've got a good family and they persuaded me to come and have the vaccination, because I was going to cancel it.

"It was fine, no problems, I didn't feel a thing, now I'm a bit more relaxed, and I'm glad I had it.

"I've not been out the house for over a year, so I was a bit worried about mixing with people, and I'm feeling fine about everything now.

"I can't believe how I got myself so worked up, and so stressed out about it.

"Like everybody, I just want to get back to some normality. Hopefully this will help. That's what I wish."

Staff nurse, Sarah Macleod gave Margaret the AstraZeneca/Oxford immunisation. She added: "The more people we can get vaccinated - especially the vulnerable individuals - they can start to get their life back together a wee bit.

"Hopefully, the amount of COVID cases declines as more people are vaccinated, and it just gives a bit of hope to everybody that we can maybe at some point in time return to nomality again.

"A lot of the people coming in are terrified. Some of them are ever so grateful to be having the COVID vaccine. There are a few individuals who are a little bit frightened about having the vaccine, but I think it's more because it was brought online really quickly. It's all very safe, and tested for everybody to have.

"A lot of the shielders have been in shielding for the last year or so. They're becoming frightened to go outside, for fear of coming into contact with the virus. The sooner they get the vaccine, and the more people who get the vaccine, the sooner they'll be able to leave their houses and potentially visit family."

WHERE ELSE CAN I GET A COVID JAG?

Mass vaccination centres:

• Edinburgh International Conference Centre (From 1 February)

• Strathbrock Partnership Centre (1-14 February)

• Royal Highland Showgrounds (From 3 February)

• Queen Margaret University (from 10 February)

• Pyramids Business Park (From 15 February)

• Royal Bank of Scotland

Community vaccination centres:

• Pennywell

• Leith Community Treatment Centre

• Gracemount Medical Centre

• Sighthill Health Centre

• Craigmillar Medical Centre

• Howden Health Centre

• East Lothian Community Hospital

• Midlothian Community Hospital

Meanwhile the UK Government has ordered 40million more doses of the Livingston-made coronavirus vaccine produced by pharmaceutical firm Valneva.

If approved, 60million Valneva jabs could start to be delivered across Britain by the second half of this year.

The latest Scottish Government figures reveal six more people have been registered dead since yesterday, after testing positive for the infection which is affecting another 848-people.

Commenting on the stats, the First Minister said: "the current lockdown is working'' as infections are falling.

She added: "That said, case numbers are still high, too high, much higher than we would want them to be, so we need to get them down further - then we need to keep them as low as possible."

Scotland's death toll of people who first tested positive within the previous 28 days has risen to 6,112-people.

There are currently 1,958-patients in hospital with confirmed cases of COVID-19 - up 17 in 24-hours.

The number of Scots being treated in intensive care remains unchanged at 143.

On Tuesday, Nicola Sturgeon will give an update on the latest lockdown rules which are currently set to remain in place until at least the middle of this month.

The statement to MSPs will provide some detail on "other steps we are planning to take", the FM said.

These include going further than current proposals by the UK Government for quarantine hotels and other measures aimed at making current travel restrictions "more effective."

She will also update on asymptomatic community testing after pilot projects were run towards the end of last year, with councils having put forward plans for making "much more extensive use" of community testing.

The review of restrictions will set out the Scottish Government's position on schools and nurseries, and "how and when we might be able to start to resume in-person learning and childcare", as well as expanded testing arrangements for these.

Ms Sturgeon told the Scottish Government's coronavirus briefing: "Tomorrow's statement is also going to cover some of the measures we will be taking to help us control the virus as we continue to suppress it, and in time gradually start to ease the lockdown restrictions."

She also defended the speed of the coronavirus vaccine rollout across Scotland after the lowest recorded daily number of vaccinations were carried out.

On Sunday, just 9,628-patients received their first vaccine dose - the fewest since the Scottish Government began publishing figures on January 11th - taking the total to 575,987.

For consecutive Sundays, the number of vaccinations has fallen to below half the previous day's figure but the First Minister said she did not know why they were "dipping a little bit on a Sunday."

Ms Sturgeon ruled out "lagging data" and said: "It looks to me as if, for some reason, we are simply falling off a bit on a Sunday...I can't tell you any more than that right now in terms of the explanation.

"I'm absolutely clear to the team that if that is an issue then we obviously need to resolve that because we need to make sure we're going at a certain pace every single day."

Facing questions about why Scotland appeared to be rolling out its vaccination programme at a slower pace than across the rest of the UK, the SNP leader 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 her government had "adapted 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.

Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross commented: "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."