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GPs and practice nurses vaccinated at mass centres

A requirement for travellers into Ireland to produce evidence of a negative test result has also come into effect.

A MASS VACCINATION drive for GPs and practice nurses has opened in three centres around Ireland.

Three centres delivering Moderna vaccine jabs have been opened in Dublin, Galway and Portlaoise and will operate across the weekend.

The initiative has been rolled out as the authorities adjust wider vaccination plans to reflect the temporary reduction in supply of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines.

The slow down in supply to European countries is due to Pfizer upgrading its production facilities in Belgium.

Ireland hopes to have vaccinated four million people by the end of September.

Tweet by @Paul Reid Paul Reid / Twitter Paul Reid / Twitter / Twitter

Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said supply was the only factor that would limit the speed of the programme rollout.

He said the anticipated European approval of the Oxford/AstraZeneca jab at the end of January would be significant.

“The truth is the only constraint at the moment is supply,” he said.

“We can speed it up but not until the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine is approved.

“We’re hoping that’s going to happen on January 29 and that will allow us then to scale-up and speed-up the programme and we’ll get that vaccine out to GP surgeries, pharmacies, mass-vaccination centres, and that will really allow us to increase the numbers being vaccinated every week quite considerably.”

Another 50 Covid-19 deaths were confirmed in Ireland on Friday, along with 3,498 new cases of the virus.

Today, bolstered travel restrictions came into effect requiring passengers arriving into ports and airports to provide proof of a negative Covid-19 test.

Passengers need to show evidence of their test result prior to boarding any plane or ferry bound for Ireland and also produce it to immigration officials upon arrival.

The PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) test for coronavirus must have been taken within 72 hours of departure.

Failure to produce evidence of a negative test result on arrival in Ireland in a criminal offence attracting a fine of up to 2,500 euro or a prison sentence of up to six months.

The new rules do not apply to anyone travelling from Northern Ireland.

Some international travellers are exempt from the new requirements, including international transport workers in the aviation, maritime and road haulage sectors.

Children aged six and under are also exempt.

Transit passengers who stop off in Ireland en route to another destination and do not leave the airport also do not need to produce a negative test result.

Extra restrictions apply to travellers arriving from Great Britain, South Africa and Brazil.

The measures, introduced in response to the emergence of new Covid-19 variants in those places, require passengers to self-isolate for 14 days on arrival in Ireland.

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    Mute Yun Wyn
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    Jul 10th 2020, 1:20 PM

    Very true especially when they decide who and what to censor. Joe rogan has a podcast with Twitter exec and pushes them on the issue

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    Mute Richard Russell
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    Jul 10th 2020, 4:32 PM

    The campaign has started to shut down free speech and citizen journalism We can have free speech as long as it is nuj free speech only the voice of the selected few will be heard

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    Mute Michael Patrick Newell
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    Jul 10th 2020, 3:24 PM

    And you really think our own government haven’t used misinformation or bots for their own use esp during elections…..i agree social media needs dealing with, but when you have countries where people have little faith or trust in their own governments, its hard then to trust them in turn to do what’s right when it comes to social media

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    Mute AOL
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    Jul 10th 2020, 7:06 PM

    Never mind social media. Not a true journalist left in any country. Every article is a copy and paste job. We should be holding all media to account

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    Mute Gary Sheahan
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    Jul 10th 2020, 3:52 PM

    Well, and I know this won’t be popular – but I feel well equipped to discern (most) of what goes online and practise a healthy level of cynicism and, on that basis, I say leave them at it. Take and keep the jobs they bring and generally promote ourselves as the safe and primary destination for FDI in the EU.

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    Mute Dáibh
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    Jul 10th 2020, 2:29 PM

    Misinformation is one of the biggest scourges in the world. Especially the last five years with Trump and Brexit. It needs to be dealt with it and the government should take the lead on that for the exact reasons laid out in this article.

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    Mute Bob Rock
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    Jul 10th 2020, 3:04 PM

    @Dáibh: Couldn’t agree more. It’s not been taken seriously enough by many governments around the world in my opinion. the only ones seemingly taking it seriously are countries like Russia and China and they’re using it with devastating results.

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    Mute The quite man
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    Jul 10th 2020, 5:57 PM

    @Bob Rock: yes we should start Defunding RTE the state broadcaster is a prime example of an institution which pushes a certain narrative. I can’t remember the last time the news, prime time or any radio interviewer actually pushed any minister or official for the truth. Now that the state has bailed out the broadcaster and Denis O Brian owns a large chunk of local radio stations I think it’s imperative that citizen journalists keep asking the important questions such as asking the new minister for children his stance on lowering the age of consent for children, or should under 16,s be allowed to remove parts of their bodies without parents knowing.

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    Mute The quite man
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    Jul 10th 2020, 6:03 PM
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    Mute Tony Humphreys
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    Jul 10th 2020, 6:57 PM

    @Dáibh: I believe Brexit and Trump happened because of the media and social medias attempts to scilence views that do not followed a center left agenda. When views are scilenced and not listed too, or simply dismissed as an ist, the scilenced vote.

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    Mute The quite man
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    Jul 10th 2020, 7:14 PM

    @Tony Humphreys: it’s the tip toe of totalitarianism

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    Mute Mikhail Ramendik
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    Jul 10th 2020, 6:08 PM

    While a certain amount of regulation might be necessary, I think this article actually showcases the dangers of the idea – because it repeatedly mentions Libya and the author is Paul Tweed.

    Paul Tweed is known to dislike Libya’s pre-2011 government because of its links to the PIRA, one of the sides of the well-known civil conflict in Belfast where he is based. https://www.irishnews.com/news/2015/10/21/news/belfast-lawyer-urges-britain-to-back-ira-libya-victims-301570/

    For all I know, somehow he never seems to talk about the government behind the other, equally vicious side of that civil conflict.

    In 2011, the government of Libya was overthrown by unprovoked invasion of a coalition of Western countries. The result of this action was massive suffering in Libya, including outright slave markets on the streets.

    Thankfully, Ireland did not directly participate in that deplorable invasion.

    Libya is in the middle of a civil war now between the GNA and the LNA. Should Ireland break its neutrality now by telling social networks which side of that civil war should have a voice and which one should not?

    I would hazard a guess that Mr. Tweed supports the GNA. I might be wrong here. But in any event, judicial participation, by censorship, in Libya’s civil war is exactly what Ireland should NOT be doing.

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    Mute James Gorman
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    Jul 10th 2020, 6:30 PM

    We need to ban anon SM accounts

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    Mute David Van-Standen
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    Jul 10th 2020, 7:24 PM

    @James Gorman: in the context of individual users, that choose to not use their actual name on social media, there is zero real anonymity.

    The manipulation of public opinion or the dissemination of propaganda by private groups for profit, or government agencies to push an ideological or political agenda, is carried out not with anonymous users but non-existent ones, that are farmed on a massive scale using computer networks of virtual machines and or thousands of mobile phones on they use software to simultaneously publish, share or like whatever message the client wants spread in realtime.

    That said, the answer is not the type of blanket censorship that the author or others are suggesting, which it basically the same logic as cutting down forests to prevent the activities of arsonists.

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    Mute Tom Keenan
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    Jul 11th 2020, 8:06 PM

    The people who run the world are worried about ordinary people finding out about how things really are on the internet hence the calls for censorship. The internet must become like the mainstream media,keep people ignorant so they can be manipulated.

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