Uptake of AstraZeneca surges after South East Queensland outbreak
Young Queenslanders have seemingly rebelled against Dr Jeannette Young’s AstraZeneca warning with a surge in those getting the vaccine in recent months.
More than 17,000 AstraZeneca jabs have gone into the arms of upstanding young Queenslanders since the vaccine became available to them through GPs, with thousands rolling up their sleeves since the state’s latest outbreak.
New federal government data also revealed Queenslanders under 40 seemingly rebelled against chief health officer Jeannette Young’s hard line advice about AstraZeneca in June, with hundreds getting the jab the day she told them to wait for Pfizer.
The increasing uptake of AstraZeneca comes against the backdrop of the latest Melbourne Institute vaccination survey, which found hesitancy had fallen in only one state — Queensland.
Since under-40s were advised on June 28 they could request an AstraZeneca jab from their GPs, a total of 17,030 doses had been administered to the age group in Queensland.
Before that advice was made, just 1596 jabs had gone into arms of Queenslanders aged under 40 in the same time frame.
Despite Dr Young’s controversial comments on June 30, when she said she didn’t “want an 18 year old in Queensland dying from a clotting illness” due to AstraZeneca, 304 doses were administered to those under 40 that day.
It was the highest daily uptake in the age group since April 13 and remained the record until August 2, when 602 doses were administered.
The uptake of AstraZeneca in under-40s has surged since southeast Queensland’s latest Delta outbreak, with 11,348 jabs administered between August 1 and August 10.
Infectious disease expert Dr Paul Griffin said the increasing uptake was likely due to the “alarming” nature of the state’s latest Delta strain cluster, which now stands at 130 cases — a majority of them children.
“There were some alarming feature around how quickly it spread … I think we were in some ways complacent (previously) that we were going to keep controlling this,” he said.
“(The outbreak) highlighted that Covid-19 had not gone away, and seeing the impact of the Delta strain tipped the balance (to getting the AstraZeneca jab) where it should have been all along.”
Meanwhile, vaccine hesitancy in Queensland had also improved according to the Melbourne Institute’s latest report card.
It was the only state to experience a decrease in hesitancy, from 30.8 per cent in late July to 26.8 per cent in early August.
Melbourne Institute’s Professor Anthony Scott, author of the report, said Covid-19 outbreaks tended to have a positive impact on vaccine hesitancy.
He noted that Queensland used to have the highest rate of vaccine hesitancy in the country, hitting a peak of 43 per cent in May.
“People didn’t have a real incentive at all to get vaccinated, before these outbreaks there was no compulsion to get vaccinated but now there is,” Prof Scott said.
As of August 10, 23 per cent of Queenslanders aged 16 and older had been fully vaccinated while 41.3 per cent had received at least one jab.
