Taoiseach Michéal Martin “can never be definitive” that Ireland won’t face another lockdown by winter

He said he can't be "definitive" a fourth wave won't be on the cards.

Taoiseach Michéal Martin has said there is a possibility that Ireland will face another lockdown this winter, in spite of plans to vaccinate most of the adult population by June. Martin also said that the European Commission is planning on a rollout of vaccinations for children and teenagers in 2022 and 2023 in an attempt to deal with the pandemic. Appearing on Virgin Media’s The Tonight Show, the Taoiseach was asked: “Are you suggesting that you would be confident that once the vaccination programme gets to a certain point that next winter we’re not going to have a fourth wave and have to go into lockdown again?” Martin replied: “I can never be definitive about that in terms of how this pandemic evolves. "It might be of interest to note that the President of the Commission was in touch with me over a fortnight ago and they look forward to a situation where we will have a faster readjustment of vaccines, particularly the mRNA vaccines to deal with any emerging variants in the future." "They're looking at vaccines to vaccinate teenagers and children. Scientists are telling the European Commission that this is the next phase, so they are ordering millions of more vaccines for 2022 and 2023," he continued. "So what I see evolving is a more advanced sort of settled pattern of dealing with this pandemic, it won’t end with one big bang.”