Anti-vaxxers offering doctors bribes to fill out illegal medical exemptions

Doctors have been offered thousands of dollars in exchange for dodgy vaccine exemptions so desperate anti-vaxxers can continue to work.

Doctors are being offered bribes of thousands of dollars to flush Covid jabs down the sink and fill out illegal clearances for unvaccinated workers to continue in their jobs.

Four medical sources have told the Herald Sun of separate instances where money has been offered by patients to avoid Covid vaccinations, with proposed bribes ranging from $1000 up to $5000.

While all have rejected the offers and tried to counsel the patients about the safety and importance of immunisation, they fear some determined anti-vaxxers will continue shopping around clinics until they can gain a falsified vaccination record.

The revelations come as clinics are also experiencing a surge in patients seeking exemptions to Covid vaccination following the Victorian government widening the number of industries requiring mandatory jabs.

Health Minister Martin Foley on Monday confirmed the state government was assisting federal counterparts in an investigation into “rogue” doctors issuing vaccine exemptions.

As revealed by the Sunday Herald Sun, at least one GP clinic in a west Melbourne Covid hotspot is being investigated over allegations of issuing dodgy exemptions. The Herald Sun has also been told of claims linked to a second inner west clinic.

Mr Foley said general practitioners across the state were “overwhelmingly regulated” by the Commonwealth government through AHPRA and other regulatory measures.

“It wouldn’t be appropriate to go into too much detail (about the investigation), but overwhelmingly our GPs are doing the right thing,” he said.

“If there are any people who are going a bit rogue, that is a matter for the federal regulatory agencies, but we are working with the commonwealth to assist them in the provision of that information.”

Mr Foley was unable to shed light on the number of medical exemptions that had reportedly been handed out.

“One is one too many, but that work is underway, and it wouldn’t be appropriate to comment,” he said.

Dr Mukesh Haikerwal says doctors are already enough under pressure as the vaccine rollout continues. Picture: Mark Stewart

Instances of patients offering bribes or seeking inappropriate exemptions are now emerging as vaccine holdouts driven to see GPs who are placed under increasing pressure by the “nasty” situations, according to Melbourne GP and former Australian Medical Association president Dr Mukesh Haikerwal.

His Altona clinic has already delivered more than 26,000 Covid vaccinations but, on Monday, was having to split its time between informing eight patients they had just tested positive to Covid and dealing with some of those showing hesitancy against the jab.

“It’s getting harder and harder and more and more complex so we’re now left with the people who don’t really want to get vaccinated and hard to get them to get vaccinated,” Dr Haikerwal said.

“Those are the ones who are quite belligerent and can be quite nasty in the vaccination clinics and in settings because they’re here under pressure.

“That’s why the communication probably needs to be much less governmental and much more from the clinical side of things.”