AstraZeneca vaccine doses yet to arrive in the NT as Commonwealth and NT trade barbs over who is to blame
A blame game between the Commonwealth and the NT government has erupted over the “delayed” arrival of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine in the Territory.
Politics
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A BLAME game between the Commonwealth and the NT government has erupted over the “delayed” arrival of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine in the Territory.
Chief Minister Michael Gunner had repeatedly said the NT was meant to receive an initial shipment of about 1400 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine on Friday, March 12 but the package never arrived.
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The federal health department confirmed the NT was allocated 1400 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine as part of the divvy up to all states and territories at the end of February.
But it is adamant the NT, unlike other jurisdictions, had not received a shipment of AstraZeneca vaccines because the Territory never gave the Commonwealth an address to send the doses to.
The NT government has rejected any suggestion it forgot to place an order for a shipment of AstraZeneca vaccine.
A spokesman for the Chief Minister said Mr Gunner’s announcement of when the AstraZeneca doses would arrive was “was based on advice from the Federal Government around vaccination doses it said were scheduled to arrive for programs under the Commonwealth’s management, within the NT”.
Mr Gunner’s spokesman said “the NT government has repeatedly been clear” that it would not need to use the AstraZeneca vaccine until Phase 1b, which is scheduled to begin on March 22.
Effectively, the non-arrival of the AstraZeneca doses are inconsequential to the NT as it has enough Pfizer doses to cover workers in Phase 1a.
As at Friday, 3519 frontline Territorians had received their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine, hundreds more than the 3000 people NT Health expected to vaccinate as part of their Phase 1a rollout.
As of Monday, frontline workers began receiving their second shot of the vaccine.
A federal health department spokeswoman said the NT had been allocated the AstraZeneca doses for use in NT government run vaccination clinics.
“It is up to the NT government when they use them,” she said.
“The Commonwealth will deliver these vaccines to the NT government when the NT Government states it is ready to receive them and provides a delivery location.”
Mr Gunner said that “despite recent changes in dates from the Commonwealth around arrival of AstraZeneca” in the NT, “current advice” indicated the first shipment would arrive in time for use in Phase 1b.
Meanwhile, Health Minister Natasha Fyles said Territory health authorities were still on a “watch and wait” holding pattern in relation to COVID-19 cases leaked out of hotel quarantine in Brisbane and Sydney.
She said health advice over the weekend pointed to the situation being “low risk”.
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