Nicola Sturgeon has defended the speed of the coronavirus vaccine rollout in Scotland after the lowest recorded daily number of vaccinations were carried out. On Sunday, just 9,628 patients received their first vaccine dose – the fewest since the Scottish Government began publishing figures on January 11 – taking the total to 575,987. For consecutive Sundays, the number of vaccinations has fallen to below half the previous day’s figure but the First Minister said she did not know why they were “dipping a little bit on a Sunday”. Speaking at the Scottish Government’s coronavirus briefing, Ms Sturgeon ruled out “lagging data” and said: “It looks to me as if, for some reason, we are simply falling off a bit on a Sunday … I can’t tell you any more than that right now in terms of the explanation.