THE ACTING CHIEF medical officer has said it is unlikely that nightclubs will open in the coming months, stopping short of suggesting that it would take a vaccine to be made available before that could be considered. 

Dr Ronan Glynn made the comments at a press briefing this evening. It comes as publicans continue to express concerns at the delayed reopening of pubs until 10 August at the earliest. 

“It’s very difficult to see a nightclub open in the context of where we’re at with this disease in Ireland and internationally,” Glynn said.

Asked if it would take a vaccine, he replied: “I don’t want to say that in an absolute sense but certainly it’s hard from a public health perspective to see nightclubs open anytime soon, given where we need to have our priorities which is on our education system, our healthcare and protecting the most vulnerable.”

He added that this opinion was informed by “the experiences we’ve seen internationally in recent weeks around clusters and increases in cases in regions associated with reopening of venues like nightclubs. 

At the same time, HSE’s chief clinical officer Dr Colm Henry said that the actions of the public as a whole will determine how and when restrictions can be lifted. 

“The greatest protection we have is to get to the lowest possible level of community transmission and to eliminate the virus and that allows us not just to open our healthcare services and education again, but also all the other social restrictions to ease. 

“But that’s predicated on us extinguishing the virus as much as possible within the community. So the more we do that, the more licence we’ll have to ease the measures we’ve put in place.”