Simon Birmingham lashes Palaszczuk’s ‘extremist’ vaccine claims, but admits Australia was pushed to ‘back of the queue’

A senior minister has blasted Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk for spreading ‘extremist’ claims about the AstraZeneca vaccine.

The federal Finance Minister has accused the Queensland Premier of spreading “extremist” views, as the rift between the state and the Morrison government grows over AstraZeneca vaccine advice.

The Queensland government has been accused of fearmongering over the AstraZeneca vaccine, after Annastacia Palaszczuk and chief health officer Jeanette Young on Wednesday urged Australians under 40 against receiving it.

Ms Palaszczuk also falsely claimed the UK had banned people aged under 40 from receiving it.

Finance Minister Simon Birmingham described the pair’s intervention as “deeply unhelpful”.

“The politicisation of the vaccine rollout that’s been attempted by some, particularly by some state politicians in Queensland, is shameful,” he told Sunrise on Thursday.

Simon Birmingham has accused Annastacia Palaszczuk and chief health officer Jeannette Young of spreading ‘extremist’ claims about the AstraZeneca vaccine. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Dan Peled

“I don’t know whether it’s because there’s a federal election due in less than a year and she’s wanting to do the Labor Party’s bidding, or whether she just stirring trouble for the sake of it.

“But whatever it is, it’s unhelpful, it should stop. All governments should be working cooperatively on the vaccine rollout.

“I urge people to listen to sound, sensible advice … rather than some of the more extremist claims that have been made.”

Covid-19 Task Force commander Lieutenant-General John Frewen revealed 2616 Australians aged under 40 had come forward to receive AstraZeneca in the past 48 hours.

Dr Young on Thursday doubled down on her claim she did not want under 40s to receive the AstraZeneca vaccine.

She had insisted Australia was not in a position where it needed to administer AstraZeneca to “young, fit, health people”, who faced a higher risk of blood clotting from the jab.

“I don’t want an 18-year-old in Queensland dying from a clotting illness who, if they got Covid, probably wouldn’t die,” she said on Wednesday.

Infectious diseases expert Nick Coatsworth on Thursday claimed she was “out on a very lonely limb”, saying the chance of dying from the jab was less than one in a million.

He said Australians should be “perfectly entitled to choose” if they had assessed the risk with their GP.

“It is the case that Australians who are young who contract Covid can go to intensive care units and do have a risk of dying from Covid-19,” he told Sunrise.

Simon Birmingham has lashed the Queensland government’s ‘unhelpful’ interventions on the AstraZeneca vaccine. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Gary Ramage

“That risk is higher than the risk of the clotting complications from the AstraZeneca vaccine.”

But Dr Coatsworth warned Australians were vulnerable to emotionally appealing misinformation, which was difficult to challenge.

“It’s very hard to sort of combat the emotional argument of the risk of death from a vaccine. Now, that is very hard to come back with cold, hard facts. But, sometimes you need to,” he said.

The federal government has been accused of unclear messaging over AstraZeneca’s risk, after publicly announcing it was not the preferred vaccine for people aged over 50 last month.

Mr Morrison confirmed the following day there was no blanket ban on AstraZeneca, but the government did not announce a no-fault indemnity scheme for doctors willing to administer it until this week.

The Coalition has long insisted Australia was at the “front of the queue” internationally on vaccines, but the country’s sluggish rollout has seen it ranked last among OECD nations.

Mr Birmingham conceded changing health advice and supply issues had been “challenging”, and seemingly walked back the government’s claim.

“European countries and drug companies have favoured those nations who had high rates of Covid for the delivery of vaccines like Pfizer, which has put countries like New Zealand and Australia at the back of the queue,” he said.

Labor frontbencher Tony Burke said Mr Birmingham had let slip what Labor had claimed since the beginning of the rollout.

“The claims that we were at the front of the queue on vaccines were not true. We’ve made the point for a while that from where Australia was positioned, you couldn’t even see the front of the queue,” he told reporters.