"Lots of people didn't get the vaccine due to hesitancy...whether it was the hesitancy around the AstraZeneca vaccine, that many shared ... but this government didn't share, I can assure you."
- PM Scott Morrison, Question Time, 30th Aug 2021
Can I just say that I am sick of the narrative which the media wants to portray that the reason why Australia is lagging behind when it comes to the vaccine rollout, is because people are hesitant.
Just like blaming people for "doing the wrong thing", this is a cruel and weak line of attack against people who were already vulnerable and already on the receiving end of the consequences of failures in government responsibilities.
Quarantine, vaccination rollout, border control, are all the responsibility of the Federal Government, and the delivery of health care services is under the control of the State Governments.
None of those things are the fault of the general public and because they are long term and systemic failures, they don't really get that much coverage in the 24 hour news cycle.
Herein lies one of the difficulties in trying to pin down the slowness in vaccine take-up. People live in that very small and strange sliver of time we call 'now' and that means that weeks and months are compressed in people's memories.
It was in November of 2020 that PM Scott Morrison announced that his government had put:
“Australia at the front of the queue for a safe and effective vaccine”.
What queue?
Two months later in January of this year, the Morrison Government announced that the start of the vaccine rollout would happen by the end of February and that 4 million people would receive their first jab by the end of March. The claim was that all 25 million Australians would be fully vaccinated by October 2021.
Things happened. The Australian Government had a barney with Pfizer. It then had a barney with AstraZeneca. AstraZeneca then had a barney with the European Union and then Italy backed by the EU blocked the first quarter of a million doses coming to Australia.
It was only on the 11th of March that the Morrison Government conceded that its target of having Australia fully vaccinated by October 2021 was impossible. It had only taken delivery of 0.7m/3.8m expected AstraZeneca doses.
It was only on the 24th of March that CSL announced that it would be making the AstraZeneca vaccine in Australia.
It was only on the 17th of May that people aged 40 to 49, were allowed to register their interest for a vaccine in NSW. The actual first available slots for that first date of booking was for the 17th of June.
I registered my intent on the 18th of May and my booking was for the Pfizer vaccination, which was at the time the only choice of one that I had. The booking date was for the 23rd of September; which would have been useless consider that the virus doesn't seem to care about booking dates when it moves from person to person.
It was possibly on 11th of June that NSW Health blamed a limo driver in the Eastern Suburbs of Sydney for 'inexcusable' actions, by him merely doing his job. He had not been vaccinated because he wasn't eligible due to the policies of both the Federal and State Governments.
It was only on the 26th of June that some part of Sydney entered lockdowns; not all, which is what NSW Health advised the Berejiklian Government at the time.
I watched on tenterhooks while the Berejiklian NSW Government progressively named only Labor voting areas as 'LGAs of concern' and then still didn't attempt any kind of mass vaccination rollout.
It was only on the 28th of June that people aged 18 to 40, were allowed to register their interest for vaccination. Before that date, only a very select group of people under the age of 40 were eligible for anything at all.
It was only on the 26th of July that the NSW Government rolled out the Astra Zeneca vaccine to pharmacists and that people over the age of 40 could go to places that were not hospitals or existing registered health care centres.
At that time the directive from NSW Health was that community pharmacies:
"Must not supply or administer the vaccine to a person who is under the age of 40, or a patient with a contraindication or precaution to vaccination;"
- NSW Health, 26th July 2021
This advice has changed.
It was only on the 19th of August that people aged 16-39 were allowed to register their interest for vaccination.
It is now August 31st and with new daily case numbers in excess of 1000, the media wants to push the narrative that it is the general public's fault for not being vaccinated quickly enough, despite the chain of events listed above.
I received my first shot of the AstraZeneca vaccine, after my booking for the Pfizer vaccine was cancelled by NSW Health and presumably given to someone else. I had to make alternative arrangements. I will get the second shot on the 22nd of August.
Having said that, cancelling vaccination appointments in an LGA of concern by the State Government is not exactly something that they can blame the general public for; when they're the ones who did it.
"Lots of people didn't get the vaccine due to hesitancy..." says Mr Morrison and the inevitable chorus of howling monkeys in the newspapers and talkback radio who can't be bothered to do any journalism beyond 'now'.
Vaccine hesitancy if it exists, utterly pales in comparison to the overwhelming story of systemic failures and missteps from the governments who are charged with the responsibility of the defence of the nation. Vaccine hesitancy is easy to report by individuals who can only see what's immediately around them. Unfortunately, the job of doing long boring rolling journalism to see to what degree that this is either true, or even matters, is lacking.
I am hesitant to name someone as vaccine hesitant when they might not have been eligible for months, might have complications due to other health reasons, or are genuinely fearful. Yelling at the general public and blaming the general public is shameful. If you want to do it, stop it.
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