 Mae'n ei wneud. Dyma mae'n gweithio'r ystafell gan gwaelio'r newid yng nghymru o'r vaccine-millostome ac ystafell pwlikell o'r oedden nhw, ym rydyn ni'n gweithio'n gweithio'r gweithio'r reiletheithau am dwylo dweud. Gweithio'n ei wneud o'r bod yn ei wneud ymlaen i'r awdurdod rheswm. Fy enw'n gweithio'n gwneud o'r gweithio. Mae'r bwysig yn gwneud bod yn gweithio'r cyffredinol, rydyn ni'n fawr yn oed yn gallu wyrdd ymgyrchol. Mae'r ffigur sy'n gweithio'r gweithio. Mae'n gweithio'r bwysig yn cyffredinol o gweithio'r 785,000 o'r bwysig. Mae'r bwysig yw'r amddangos o'ch 5 yma o'ch cyfrifol arweithio'r gweithio. Mae'n ddifol i'r gweithio'r cyfrifol yn gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio'r gweithio. Mae'r vaccine yn ystod o'r ffordd yn ymddangos ar y virus. Mae'n hyn o'r ffordd yma'r mhawr yma, a'r hyn o'r ffordd, ac rwy'n gael i'r ffordd. Mae'n credu i'ch cael ei wneud o'r gweithio i'r ffordd yn ei wneud. Mae'r bwysig wedi'r hollol yn ymddangos yma i'r ffordd ffwrdd yma. If anyone wasn't sure about having the vaccine when they were first asked and has now changed their mind, it's not too late to get an appointment. There are contact details on every health board website and on our Welsh Government website too. Today we begin the next big effort to vaccinate people in priority groups 5-9 at the same time as we are providing second dose appointments to all those in the first four priority groups. We'll start by offering appointments to people in groups 5 and 6. This includes people aged 65-69, people aged 16-64 with an underlying health condition, younger adults in residential care settings and a great many unpaid carers who are looking after people who are vulnerable. This is another massive logistical effort and we'll be using all of the resources we have available to use in the days and weeks ahead, including local pharmacies to make sure we can vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible. But we do have to factor in a temporary load on a vaccine supply across the UK to our plans over the next couple of weeks. I want to be clear that we have worked this into our plans and this will not delay anybody's second dose appointment. We expect supplies to quickly pick up again by March and if this happens we will be on track to offer everyone in groups 5-9 a vaccine by the end of April. This week the Cabinet will be holding the three-week review of the coronavirus restrictions. We've already said we'll use whatever headroom we have to get our youngest children back into school after half-term. We've been working with local education authorities, with teaching and non-teaching staff unions to develop a phased and flexible plan to enable foundation phases children to restart from next Monday. You'll also know that the first minister said that we are looking at whether there are any other small changes we're able to make to give families a bit more flexibility after such a long lockdown. We are, though, continuing to see positive reductions in cases within our communities. The seven-day average rate has fallen and has remained below 100 cases per 100,000 people for the first time in many, many months. The positivity rate is less than 10% and the R number remains below 1 at between 0.7 and 0.9. All of this is incredibly positive and is all thanks to your hard work and your sacrifices over these winter months. We do have to be very careful about how we come out of lockdown because of the presence of new and even more infectious strains of the virus here in the UK. The highly infectious Kent variant is now the most dominant strain of the virus here in Wales. Clusters of a mutated version of the Kent strain have been identified just over our border in Bristol and Liverpool and the UK government has extended its surge testing to more areas of England to try and detect and contain the South African variant. Thirteen cases of the South African variant have been detected in Wales and all but two have links within international travel. These variants have added yet another dimension to the pandemic. It remains important that we all work together to get the levels of coronavirus in our communities as low as we possibly can. The best way of reducing the likelihood of new variants emerging is to keep new infections low. I want to finish though with some positive news. Throughout the pandemic people in Wales have played a vital role in helping to search for breakthrough treatments and vaccines. Hundreds of people were involved in the trials for Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine and many more are testing two new vaccines. Nearly 14,000 people have now been recruited to COVID-19 studies since last year looking into treatments for patients at all stages of the disease. All seven organisations in NHS organisations in Wales and 1100 people from across Wales are involved in the recovery trial which is led by the University of Oxford. This large-scale study is looking for treatments to help people hospitalised with suspected or confirmed COVID-19. It has already shown that the low-cost steroid dexamethazone reduces death by up to a third in people with severe respiratory complications and it has reported that an arthritis drug could save one in 25 seriously ill coronavirus patients. It has also helped to show what treatments don't work including the malaria drug hydroxyl hydroxychloroquine. Sorry there we are, I finally got there. All health boards with intensive care units are recruiting to a trial led by Imperial College London which is aiming to identify treatments for people requiring intensive care. All 250 patients have taken part in this study about 250 patients and it has shown two rheumatoid arthritis drugs can reduce the risk of death by nearly 10%. As ever I'm grateful for everyone's sacrifice, we all need to keep on following the rules and doing the right thing in the weeks and months ahead. Thank you, I'll take questions out from journalists and as usual all of the questions will continue to be broadcast on our own social media channels and the first question today from the easily pronounced name is Owen Clark from BBC Wales. Diolch yn fawr, Cynon Da hefyd Minister. Obviously vaccines offer hope but how much but much of the progress I suspect done so far in reducing case rates and death rates have been down to the sacrifices people have made following restrictions but are you seeing any specific data to show the specific impact of vaccines so far as distinct to the impact of lockdown or when and how will you or your scientific advisers be able to assess exactly that? Well that's harder to tell because you're right that most of the reduction that we have seen has been because of lockdown and the way that people in Wales have supported those measures and that's what's so important to recognise and thank people for what they're doing and the figures show with our case rates continuing to fall that that's been effective the lockdown and the response of people across Wales has really worked the vaccines will help to protect people when there is some more mix and we know that they're even though our positivity rates are less than 10% we're still a long way from the very low rates we were at at the end of the summer where rates were down to two or three and a hundred thousand people as we go forward though the declining death numbers that we are starting to see in Wales want to see those remain at low levels and that will give us more room to make more choices in the future with the confidence that most of our most vulnerable citizens have had some protection from the vaccine so it's both about reducing deaths in the here and now with the reducing death figures and it's hard to unpick the combination of the vaccine and the lockdown measures themselves but we really do think we're going to see the benefit of the mass vaccination programme as we move through the spring and into the summer and hopefully seeing a sustained reduction in the level of harm that has been recalls and then of course the difficult task of recovery because you'll know Owen that our NHS is still incredibly busy as we speak today. Thank you very much it's half term of course as many people will be looking towards Easter thinking what life will be like then first ministers talked about progress on case rates you talk about the complicating nature of the variants that are around right now to what extent in your view does this lockdown need to last long enough that it becomes the lockdown that ends the need for any future long lockdown in Boris Johnson's words progress needs to be irreversible. Well I think the danger is we try to set out absolutes we talk of whether this is irreversible or whether nothing else will happen in the future and actually throughout the last year of this pandemic the changes in the way the virus has transmitted the changes in our knowledge of the virus have meant that we have had to make different choice at various points in time what we want to do is to make choices based on the best available data and information to see case rates driven as low as possible and then to have a cautious exit out of the current lockdown we're in but if we make cautious steps outwards then it will still very much feel like a former lockdown for most people because we're not going to be returning straight away to what we thought of as our normal lives just over a year ago so yes we don't want to see a return to having to introduce more restrictions but I wouldn't say that we could give a cast iron guarantee that would never happen if for example we'd found our way to have a number of restrictions removed but we then saw a significant upswing in the virus whether it's a new variant or otherwise then we would have a responsibility to act and that's why we all need to continue reminding ourselves that we've got to this place with schools about to return next week with some of our youngest children attending with lower death rates with lower case rates all across the country because of all the things we've done the government our health service and crucially everyone in the public who has supported the measures and done the right thing it's difficult I know but it really is making a difference having to keep well safe and reduce the number of people coming to harm thank you all and we've now got James Crichton Smith from ITV Wales thank you health minister um we're still getting told by some over 70s that they've not even been approached for an appointment um how disappointed are you that's the case um and should they be contacting the NHS and who shouldn't be contacting the NHS because there seems to be discrepancies or differences between different cohorts who should be and who shouldn't be actively phoning for an appointment well obviously if there are people who are saying they haven't been contacted that is disappointing but then we know that our health services sent out reminders and appointments it's possible some of those reminders won't have reached the people they're intended for but on today's figures James you'll know that in people in the 70 to 74 age bracket 89.5% of those people have actually had their vaccine not just been contacted but had their first dose over 90% of 75 year olds and over have had their vaccine so we're getting to extraordinarily high numbers of people people in the first four priority groups that's people over the age of 70 if they haven't had an appointment then they should contact their health service so those contact details available for all of those local health boards on local health board contact websites and also on the Welsh Government site as well everyone in the next group we're rolling out to will be contacted by the health service so if you're under 70 then the NHS will be contacting you to invite you to come forward for your appointment if you're in this particular category group so that's helpful and everyone of course who has been shielding should also have been contacted too so people in the first priority group will largely know who they are they're the people who can contact the NHS if they've yet to have their vaccine and if they haven't got an appointment date everyone else please wait for the health service to get to you because I think we've shown successfully we're getting through this very quickly when supplies increase again you can expect the rate of delivery to rapidly increase too. Thank you and the reports over the weekend of being able to potentially look forward to Alfresco dining in the spring what is a reasonable expectation for people in Wales to have as we look to the spring and if you can't give us specific things to look forward to why? I think a reasonable expectation is that as we move through each of our three-week reviews we'll be upfront with the people of Wales about the headroom we have and the choices we make we've been very clear that schools will start in a phased way with our youngest children returning on the Monday after half term and as a parent I'm glad not to have homeschooling this week so I look forward to those children returning and if all is well and we can demonstrate that's a safe return for children, their families and our staff and we have other choices for future three-week reviews. I think the worst thing that I could do would be to try to give that sort of guarantee of progress against a timeline that doesn't take account of the reality of what happens as we ease out of lockdown so that's what we'll do we'll be cautious, we'll be clear, each three-week review will set out what we expect to do and what we may be able to do in the review periods following as we get more certainty on the sustained reduction in cases that we all need to see before we can take the next stage in unlocking because I think the worst thing possible would be to move too quickly and to be reckless and then to have to put the brakes on or to not understand which of the measures we've eased may have caused a bounce back in the virus and we've been through this before of course James and I think that people can expect that same cautious and sensible approach from the government as we all want to return to more freedoms and more areas of our lives to enjoy together. Thank you I've now got Rebecca Miles from Global. Thank you Health Minister you've mentioned there again you're using whatever headroom we have to get the youngest children back into schools after half-term so now at this stage are there any further plans to prioritise teachers in getting their vaccinations and if not why not? Well I'm happy to readdress this question we've had this several times over but our youngest children age seven and under will be going back from a week today we know that our youngest children are less likely to suffer harm but also still less likely to transmit the virus to other people including crucially adults and of course we've already had education staff and I'm tremendously grateful to them who've been staffing our hubs even through the period of the last few weeks so those hubs have been operating in every local authority so that key workers essential workers have been able to go about their duty not just people on the front line of health and social care and so we haven't seen significant numbers of people acquiring COVID from working in those education hubs that should give people some confidence but we've chosen to follow the scientific advice in having a phased approach to reopening so we can understand the impact not so much just of what happens within a school because again we're talking about the lowest risk children who are returning to school face-to-face learning from the 22nd of February but what that means in terms of the choices that adults then make if they don't have young children in their home because that's part of the concern we've regularly had and actually all of the study evidence we have demonstrates that teachers as an occupational group don't have a materially higher risk than the rest of the public when it comes to getting COVID becoming ill and coming to harm the reason why we've got our priority groups to work through and vaccination is that those groups of people do have an appreciably higher risk of coming to harm needing to go to hospital and potentially losing their lives we're still very much in the business of saving people's lives and the choices that we are making to help keep Wales safe as soon as we can get to studying all of the first nine priority groups we can then move on with the advice we expect from the independent expert joint committee on vaccination and immunisation and that will then guide the choices that I then have to make about directing the next stage of the successful vaccination rollout here in Wales. We know that the majority of people in Wales have been sticking to the rules and we're starting to see positive signs from that but are you concerned that if the strictest of these measures are not eased soon then more people would be tempted to break them? There's always a balance in people's fatigue with the extraordinary restrictions that we've all had to live with and again it was never my intention in coming into public life to introduce measures like this to intrude into so many areas of people's lives but it's been done by necessity to keep Wales safe and to keep people alive despite all the measures we know we've suffered thousands of deaths in Wales and all those grieving families would look other people now I'm sure and say the virus is very real the harm it's caused is very real and we don't want other families to go through this and that's the balance that we have to have in our minds all the time. We know this is a significant public health risk an unfinished pandemic we also know there's harm being done to the economy and people's mental health and well-being. We will continue to weigh those points up and I'm tremendously grateful to the great majority of people who are not just sticking with the rules but have indicated in all of the survey evidence we have they'd rather see the rules continue in place until it really is safe to ease out of lockdown and actually the great majority of people's greatest concern is coming out too quickly having another return of the virus so those are the different challenges we have as we make choices and you'll expect to hear more from the First Minister during the week as we get to that three-week review. Thank you of now Andy Davis from Channel 4. Thank you. Which people with asthma in Wales should expect to be vaccinated in group six? Are you taking the same approach as in England and if so what would you say to those people who thought that they were being prioritised for vaccination who in fact aren't and feel the Gold Coast have been moved? Well we're looking at the same clinical evidence and advice and our chief medical officer working with each other as well so I do expect we're going to have a consistent position not just in England and Wales but across the UK. This is all about understanding the level of risk that people have and I do understand that as ever there will be people who will be disappointed if they're not within that particular priority group. We expect not just to have the evidence and information we've published around all those people within group six as well as that information being published and available in the vaccination green book we'll also I wanted to publish here in Wales to have some clarity so people can look for that information themselves as well as receiving their invite letters and I accept there will be some people who'll be disappointed who won't find themselves in group six when they're expected to be but this is still about understanding risk and how we vaccinate people in turn to save the maximum number of lives to avoid harm and as you'll know Andy because of your excellent coverage of the reality of dealing with and treating people on the front line with Covid the harm that will come into our NHS system if we don't get to people most at risk from hospitalisation or death in the earlier stages of the unfinished but ultimately so far successful vaccination programme. And just following up on what Owen Clarke asked earlier just to be clear have you seen or are you aware of any real world data on how effective the vaccine is proving either here in Wales or more broadly in the UK and if not when might you expect to see that. Yeah we've got some up to date information there are more trials that are being run by both of the vaccine manufacturers and the information is being shared with the MHRA and others as well so that is showing that actually there is a high level response to both vaccines it's what's giving us more confidence about the rollout but trying to get back to that earlier question of how do you apportion the success in the reducing case rates and the reducing amount of hospitalisation and the reducing numbers of people dying that's really hard to try to give you a mathematical answer as to what portion is down to the lockdown rates and people's adherence and what portion with the vaccine but we do know that having an effective vaccine rolling out at rapid pace means we are protecting more and more people so as people do return to different parts of their lives with more mixing through a cautious but an ease way out of these lockdowns we can be really clear that vaccine will provide crucial protection to save lives and protect our national health service from being overwhelmed. Thank you Andrew and I've got Will Hayward from Wales Online. Thank you health minister can we have small clarity on what you mean by small changes to give families more flexibility in the next review this must have been a topic of regular conversation can you give us some insight into what exactly you're considering. As I say the small changes we're talking about you've seen before Will when we've eased out of lockdown the small changes we've made to each three week period. Now you know that we're looking to use the majority of our headroom to make sure that schools reopen for our youngest children aged seven and under from Monday next week. We're looking to see if there are other small things we can do and the reason we're saying small things is we're trying to manage people's expectations that we're not going to suddenly have a wide scale opening of all the measures and lots of mixing between different households. We haven't finished the conclusions that the cabinet will reach and the up-to-date information we'll have from our scientific advisor from the chief medical officer department and of course the up-to-date data on case transmission rates and where we are within the NHS. That's why I'm not going to get drawn into speculating on a suite of individual potential measures because we're trying to be as upfront with people as we can without getting drawn into unhelpful speculation. Sorry, I don't think it's speculation. I think it's you must be considering these. Can people in Wales not at least know what things you are considering? If I can ask you a question about vaccinations and we've been approached by a man in his 90s in Cardiff who said he was offered a jab and those who were supposed to administer the jab at his house didn't turn up on two occasions. Do you know how many people in Wales who are in the first four groups that are still awaiting a jab due to cancellations or no shows from health care workers? No, and you wouldn't expect me to have those figures here still in front of you will. We are working with our NHS in every part of Wales to make sure that no one is left behind and understand that if people are waiting for an appointment, waiting for a vaccine to be delivered there'll be some understandable anxiety. When you look at the figures of the number of people we've reached, how quickly we've got through those figures, I think that should give people a continuing sense of confidence and as I say the NHS won't leave people behind. So we've already made clear that the contact details are available for every health board and I have not just the person that you referred to but other people who may be anxious and concerned about when their vaccine is going to arrive will have some confidence about contact in their local health board but equally real confidence the NHS will not leave you behind and you will get the protection that the vaccine offers. Thank you and I've got Rob Taylor from rexham.com. Good afternoon, there are planned temporary vaccination centre closures in south Wales due to supply issues and locally we're told the LVC and the Catrin Finch Centre of the University will also be closing. I appreciate that it's a very specific query but is it possible to fact check that and will there also be centre closures across north Wales and if so where and it has been referred that that's all part of the plan so how long are these closures in place? Okay so each health board will set up for its local population and local media how they're going to manage a slight dip in vaccination supply that we're expecting for the next two weeks. That may mean that some centres are closed that may mean that we're delivering more through local healthcare but each health board will need to manage that in accordance with its local population where it still is in terms of its supply while still managing of course the second doses that are carrying on. We expect as I said that when we get back into March we're going to see a return to increased levels of vaccination supply available to us and that will mean we'll have to stand up all of those arrangements and we'll then be making greater use of local pharmacy as well because we've yet to maximise our ability and our capacity to deliver vaccinations across Wales so we can go even faster if we have the supply in place and if we have the certainty of the future supply that's why the next two weeks are not something that I think people should be overly concerned about. You'll still see tens of thousands of people vaccinated each week but we'll then return to an even more significant upswing after that and again that's why we can have some confidence I think that we'll get to everyone in groups one to nine by the end of April as supply lines remain as we expect. Thank you and a couple of weeks ago I asked about FFP2 mask mandate in some countries. Last week the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention the CDC in the United States have recommended double masking. I appreciate the Welsh Command's guidance as a base level recommendation but is Wales in the UK becoming an outlier on face covering advice as it's still referenced a tight scarf being acceptable? I wouldn't say that we are becoming an outlier this is one of the things where we're constantly reviewing the public health advice and the impact on transmission and it's one of the control measures we have in place because actually from earlier questions the most successful control measure in reducing transmission rates has been reducing people's contact with each other and that's thanks to the hard work and the sacrifice of people across the country. When people are going out I regularly see people out wearing masks and I think really positive adherence to that message of how we can keep each other safe and wearing a face covering when we're in an indoor public place. If there's a need to change our advice then I expect that to be reviewed by our chief men across department with up-to-date scientific evidence and I said many many times if the evidence change is that I'm more than happy to change the decision we make the advice and the guidance we give to help keep people safe because that is what this is all about in the here and now and we need more of that evidence-based approach when we're looking to the recovery and the long journey ahead of us. Thank you Rob and I've got Tom Magner from Carersworld Life. Thank you Health Minister. I'm just picking up on that last question from Rob. We're hearing a lot from our viewers on a range of issues about face covering or face mask exemptions will come to some of them on other briefings but at this stage can you remind us what the criteria are for such exemptions and what the people concerned have to do to prove they qualify for this exemption? Well there isn't any specific proof that we're asking for I think it'd be really difficult if we required people to have a specific form of ID and you'd then think about who would need to sign that off and I don't think that to help for use of the time of people in our health service. There are a number of people who have a range of different conditions. We've published guidance on this previously so there are some people who have respiratory conditions where wearing a face covering can be unhelpful. You know that our young children don't need to wear a face covering either. There are also some people where there's a mental health issue for some people in terms of wearing covering so it's about people being honest with each other about why they do or don't need to wear a covering and I can say there are very high levels of compliance when I go out. I have seen hardly anyone in a shop that I've been in over the last few months who isn't wearing a face covering and that is because I think people are committed to doing the right thing and the signage is really clear and you know if there are people who really can't wear a face covering and all of the shops I've been into in recent weeks there are someone at the front before people go in to be able to have a discussion with and I also see that a great number of shops are providing face coverings to people before they go in to in case you've forgotten one so I actually think we're in a much better place now and that's what I'd like to see us all think about what we can do to make sure we keep each other safe not think about what someone else can do but what can I do to make sure I'm doing the right thing. You put a great deal on the honesty of people which is obviously good to hear but it appears that face mask exemption cards can be purchased from at least one major online outlet with that without as far as we can see requiring any proof also it appears that you can for no charge at all print one of your own op on the Welsh Government website are you happy with that? Yeah I think that is the right approach if we wanted to have a regulated approach to a card that said that you didn't need to wear a face covering then I think you'd see extra demand going into our health care system at a time when our health care system is working incredibly hard with all of the normal pressures of health care treatment that come with the winter and the extraordinary pressures of the pandemic and I don't think that would be a good use of people's time and again there are many parts of this pandemic that rely on people doing the right thing making sure that people responsibly use the ability not to wear a face covering because they honestly have a condition that means that they don't need to is one of those together with all the other things we've asked people to do and the great majority of us have done that and that's why I'm tremendously grateful to the people of Wales for doing so because we wouldn't see the sustained reduction in case rates we have today from the extraordinary highs just before Christmas of 650 to in 100,000 now we're down to less than 100,000 and less than 100 and 100,000 in terms of our case rates more than half of our local authorities have case rates of less than 100 as well the positive rate being less than 10% that's because people would have been doing the right thing and being honest about what they can do what they should do and we'll need more of that in the weeks ahead to keep all of us safe and well so I'm very grateful to the people of Wales to our NHS the way they've worked with people local authorities as their partners the military support we had in the vaccination programme all the volunteers and everyone across Wales who is doing the right thing many thanks Tom I'll see you and your colleagues in the near future