A consultant in infectious diseases at St James's Hospital in Dublin has given a cautious welcome to the findings of a UK study which shows two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech and AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccines can protect against the B1617 variant of the virus.
Prof Cliona Ni Cheallaigh told RTÉ's Brendan O'Connor programme that key to the effectiveness of vaccines is that two doses is needed to protect against the variant, which first emerged in India.
She said the study shows "it is not a doomsday scenario" that had been feared, with the variant being totally vaccine-resistant.
Prof Ni Cheallaigh said the situation has changed from the variant being a "very big dark black cloud" on the horizon to a cloud that is "grey in the distance" but we