A location announced by the Government as one of 37 planned Covid-19 vaccination centres has now been told it won’t be used for the rollout.
The Seven Oaks Hotel in Carlow was on a list of “confirmed locations” announced by the Department of Health on Monday.
On Tuesday morning its manager Michael Walsh said he was “surprised” by this as it hadn’t been confirmed with the hotel.
He said the HSE had been in contact and inspected the hotel’s ballroom last month, but he had not been contacted since.
Mr Walsh said the hotel would be happy to play its part in the vaccination programme by hosting the centre.
“As soon as we get people vaccinated, the sooner all of our hotels can open up and we can get things going.
“It’s frustrating. I’d rather know either way so we can go ahead and plan for it and make sure it’s ready to go.”
Mr Walsh told The Irish Times on Tuesday evening that the HSE had now contacted the hotel to say the Seven Oaks was no longer being selected as a venue.
He said the hotel was told it was initially thought it would be a suitable location but that it was later decided “they needed a bigger space than we have”.
On Monday the Department of Health had released a statement saying that Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly had confirmed locations for 37 vaccination centres across Ireland. It said: "The 37 centres have been confirmed by the HSE".
Asked about the Seven Oaks being dropped as a vaccination centre location, the HSE said the list was “subject to change as the rollout progresses, and as additional locations are identified.”
The Carlow location is now said to be The Barrow Centre at the local Institute of Technology. The location is not on the list published by the Government on Monday.
The Irish Times asked the HSE to confirm that the other locations announced on Monday would be used as vaccination centres. The HSE did not confirm this.
A HSE spokeswoman said the Seven Oaks hotel had been “very helpful” and is “well located”.
“However in light of the changes to vaccination centre requirements for registration space and the necessity for at least two separate pharmacy rooms, it has emerged that there would not be available space to give meaningful numbers of vaccination booths,” she added.
She said that following a detailed inspection of the area it was decided that the Sports Hall at Carlow IT “offers an excellent solution in terms of facilities including car parking capacity, easy, level access to the building with separate in/out routes and excellent internal space and vaccine booth layouts.”
A spokesman for Mr Donnelly responded to a request for an explanation for the change in location saying: “The plan was always intended to be agile and iterative.
“Through the HSE we have committed to opening centres in each of the population centres identified.
“In the vast majority of cases we have agreed contracts and construction work has commenced in over 80 per cent of them.”
The spokesman said that at present he was not aware of any other locations that may be dropped from the list published on Monday.
The original list noted that contracts are “to be finalised” at two proposed locations - Longford Slashers GAA club and the Faithful Field GAA Centre in Co Offaly.
