Barwon Health plans coronavirus vaccine rollout

Barwon Health is planning the region’s rollout of a coronavirus vaccine after the Prime Minister’s shock announcement that vulnerable groups could be immunised in just six weeks.

Barwon Health is planning the region’s rollout of a coronavirus vaccine after the Prime Minister’s shock announcement that vulnerable groups could start to be immunised in just six weeks.

Scott Morrison revealed Australia’s plans to start rolling out vaccinations to high priority groups, including border and hotel quarantine workers, by mid to late February.

He said the approvals process for the COVID-19 vaccine was moving “considerably faster” than for other jabs and it would only be rolled out once it had received final approvals.

The Pfizer vaccination was expected to be the first approved and administered, followed by AstraZeneca in February.

Until Thursday’s announcement, the rollout of the vaccine across Australia was not expected until March.

Barwon Health’s Public Health Unit deputy director Associate Professor Daniel O’Brien said the unit was in the “early stages” of planning the region’s rollout of a COVID-19 vaccine.

“We will work closely with DHHS and local providers, including General Practice and community organisations, to develop a detailed plan,” Prof O’Brien said.

Prof O’Brien welcomed the sped-up rollout of the vaccine and said the unit would bolster its workforce with experienced immunisation professionals.

“We are in the process of identifying healthcare workers with immunisation experience, as well as training up staff to increase our immunisation service, in anticipation of high demand for the COVID-19 vaccine this year,” Prof O’Brien said.

Under the Federal Government’s vaccination Australia’s population would be split into five categories in order of priority, with frontline workers and the vulnerable up first before the general population and then children.

Barwon Health is preparing to administer Covid-19 vaccines

The free and voluntary vaccine will be administered across two doses, about a month apart.

Mr Morrison said the exact rollout timeline was dependant on the Therapeutic Good Administration giving the vaccines final approval, as well as delivery of the doses being made overseas.

He dismissed claims by the federal opposition that the vaccine had been delayed, insisting the processes were moving “swiftly and safely”.

“Doing that is critical to public confidence in the vaccine,” he said.

Major vaccination hubs will be set up to administer the Pfizer-BioNTech jabs, while teams of nurses and doctors will be assembled to go into nursing homes to inject patients there.

The federal government has already purchased 10 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine — enough to inoculate 5m — which has to be imported and stored at -70 degrees Celsius.

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Meanwhile, Victoria recorded no new cases of coronavirus as of Thursday, with 38 cases still active across the state.

But health authorities urged people who visited Chadstone shopping centre between 6am and 2pm on Boxing Day to get tested as they work to determine how a man in his 30s came to contract COVID-19.

Genomic testing has linked the case to NSW’s Northern Beaches cluster but experts have not yet determined how the man was infected.

Barwon Health confirmed 454 people were tested for coronavirus across its sites on Wednesday.

Greater Geelong has no active cases of coronavirus and no local exposure sites have been identified.

Originally published as Barwon Health plans coronavirus vaccine rollout