The island’s second vaccination centre opened yesterday morning at the King Edward VII Memorial Hospital’s former emergency room.

The new centre, which had 150 appointments scheduled yesterday, can provide up to 200 vaccinations a day.

It will boost the vaccination programme’s capability, alongside the first centre, opened on January 11 at Prospect in Devonshire.

Kim Wilson, the health minister, said the island’s next delivery of Pfizer vaccine from Britain is on schedule to arrive on the Thursday British Airways flight.

The shipment of 19,500 vaccines will be able to treat almost 10,000 people.

The vaccine is being given by appointment only from 8am to 5pm Mondays to Fridays.

Ms Wilson said the opening of the new centre was in line with the Government’s plan to vaccinate almost one third of the island’s population by the end of March.

She added that updates and figures on vaccination progress will be given at today’s Covid-19 briefing.

Ms Wilson said the opening of additional vaccination centres would be “revealed in time”.

She added: “We need to make sure that we are properly managed and that we have the supply chain as well as sufficient staff.”

Judy Richardson, the Bermuda Hospital’s Board chief of nursing, said the hospital hoped to extend its vaccination hours to Saturday “in short order”.

She said it was appropriate that the old emergency department would become “once more a place where lives are being saved each day”.

“At Bermuda Hospitals Board, we have seen the most unwell people suffering from Covid-19.”

There have been 59 people admitted to the hospital for the illness since last March, with seven treated in the intensive care unit.

Ms Richardson added: “We have seen the worst this disease can do.”

The new centre has wheelchair access, with a one-way flow of people.

Ms Richardson said people should show up five minutes before their appointed time and use the marked entrance in the old wing of KEMH at the access off Berry Hill Road in Paget, rather than Point Finger Road.

She told the public: “Do not go into the main lobby or into the hospital – you can’t access the clinic from inside.”