SCOTLAND is still on track to offer a first dose of Covid-19 vaccine to all adults by the end of July despite fears over supplies of the jag.

Health Secretary Humza Yousaf stressed the target will still be hit by the end of next month but warned the programme “can’t go even faster” to combat the spread of the Delta variant with issues over supply of the Pfizer vaccine.

Last week, Mr Yousaf warned that reduced supplies of the Pfizer vaccine could restrict the rollout in Scotland.

Speaking on the BBC’s Sunday Show, the Health Secretary stressed that “in any vaccination rollout programme, one of the limiting factors is vaccine supply”.

He added: “To be very, very clear, we have enough supply to complete our programme.

“Our next milestone will be the end of next month to complete all first doses for the adult population and we are on schedule to do that.

"But clearly, if we have more supply, we can go faster – we can do more drop-in clinics for example.”

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Amid fears supplies of the Pfizer vaccination are to be “tight” over the coming weeks, Mr Yousaf wrote to UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock for reassurance that supplies of the Pfizer jag can be increased.

Mr Yousaf said he is pleased by the response from the UK Government.

He said: “I spoke to Matt Hancock about this at the tail end of last week and had some message exchange also with UK Government minister for vaccines Nadhim Zahawi. Both were very positive.

“I think all four nations are in the same place around that limit of supply of Pfizer.

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“I’m reassured by what Matt Hancock said in terms of the conversations they are having with Pfizer and the work the vaccine taskforce is doing.”

Mr Yousaf stressed the importance of increasing supplies of vaccine if possible.

He said: “We will continue to work together collaboratively to see what we can do to source more supply. If we don’t get more supply, then we can’t go even faster, as we’d like to do.

“This is a race, as we know –one lane the virus is in, the other lane the vaccine. We want to make sure the vaccine is absolutely ahead of the virus.”