Covid vaccine Qld: Young adults holding state vax rates back

One age bracket has more ground to make up than any other when it comes to reaching the crucial 80 per cent vaccination rate, it can be revealed, with Queensland on track to hit the milestone early if it wasn’t for them.

Young adults are holding the state back from hitting an early 80 per cent vaccination rate, which would finally open the state up to the rest of the country.

New figures show that the 20-34 age bracket have more ground to make up than any other age bracket, with only 60 per cent fully vaccinated.

Disturbingly there are still more than 400,000 Queenslanders in that age bracket yet to receive even one dose.

The jab rate across age groups older than 50 are all higher than 80 per cent, with those in the 35 to 49 age group in the low 70 percentile.

An infectious disease expert said specific details about the rules unvaccinated people face need to be detailed by the state government to jolt hesitant Queenslanders into getting vaccinated.

Melbourne Institute health economist Professor Anthony Scott said young people, particularly men, assumed they were “invincible” and didn’t need the vaccine – a reluctance exacerbated in states like Queensland which had dodged Covid-19 outbreaks.

Infectious disease expert Dr Paul Griffin said a government campaign based on what the next few months would look like for someone who is vaccinated versus unvaccinated could bump uptake of the jab.

“We all expect there to be a plan, but we haven’t seen that … we haven’t heard yet how that’s going to be regulated or enforced,” he said.

“Outlining what freedoms we can restore to people preferentially … would get the rates up where they need to be.”

Health workers at a pop up Covid-19 vaccination clinic at Brisbane City Hall. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

Earlier this month Deputy Premier Steven Miles said there would “be other freedoms that are only available to people who have been vaccinated”.

But the government has yet to release details, and had signalled it may be up to businesses to police restrictions.

“The government will work through those issues,” a spokesman said.

About 76.5 per cent of Queenslanders aged 16 and older had received at least one jab.

Vaccine Operations Coordinator acting deputy commissioner Shane Chelepy said he was confident the state would hit 80 per cent by December 17 at the current rate.

“There’s no question about that,” he said.

He said Queensland was expected to hit the 90 per cent vaccinated milestone in early 2022.

“NSW and Victoria, they’ll get to 90 per cent before us, but if you look at NSW, they were in a lockdown for eight weeks, so they really had an incentive to come out and get their freedoms back,” he said.

“We need people to get vaccinated to hold our freedoms.”

The Acting Deputy Commissioner said authorities were still working through how police border checkpoints would operate when the state reached 80 per cent.

Originally published as Covid vaccine Qld: Young adults holding state vax rates back