ADF called in to accelerate COVID-19 vaccine rollout

Greg Hunt has opened the door to accelerating the COVID-19 vaccine rollout and moving on to the next phase of inoculations.

COVID-19 vaccination doses arrive in Sydney. Picture: Getty Images

Health Minister Greg Hunt has opened the door to accelerating the COVID-19 vaccine rollout and moving on to the next phase of inoculations, as the Australian Defence Force joins the jab effort.

Reports emerged on Tuesday that the ADF would be brought in to assist with the vaccine rollout in the commonwealth’s aged-care vaccination program, particularly in rural and regional areas.

It came as AstraZeneca’s Australian manufacturer, CSL, told a parliamentary committee it was still weeks away from producing a million doses a week, as fears grow the federal government will miss its October deadline to fully vaccinate all Australians who want a COVID-19 jab.

Mr Hunt said on Tuesday that despite the slow rollout of the first week, the arrival of 300,000 AstraZeneca doses from overseas and the ramp-up in domestic production could see the phase 1b group — Australians over the age of 70, health workers, and Aboriginal Australians over the age of 55 — receive their COVID vaccines earlier than anticipated.

“(October) remains our objective time frame. What this is about is a ramp-up … it may be possible to bring forward commencement of phase 1b for … health workers,” Mr Hunt said in Sydney.

“That has been put forward by one state, given the level of AstraZeneca doses. We’ll work with them.”

The federal government and the states have promised a significant acceleration in the vaccine rollout, after the aim of 60,000 ­inoculations by the end of February was missed on Sunday.

Data from the federal health department shows that Victoria administered only 30 per cent of the available doses at state Pfizer hubs to quarantine and hospital workers in the past week, while Queensland, where two people were injected with four times the recommended amount, managed to administer only 22 per cent.

NSW administered 75 per cent of its allocated doses in week one, and the commonwealth used 72 per cent of its doses that were set aside for aged care and disability care residents and workers.

Queensland Health Minister Yvette D’Ath said the state had actually exceeded its own vaccination target —– despite the underuse of the dose allocation — and would ramp up efforts.

“Queensland exceeded its target in the first week of the rollout, with 2030 vaccinations administered,” she told The Australian.

“As three more vaccination hubs come online this week, we’ll continue to ramp up the rollout to ensure our most vulnerable frontline workers get the vaccine.”

Mr Hunt also said on Tuesday that more than 300,000 doses would be allocated to the states over the next 10 days.

CSL’s Melbourne production line of AstraZeneca doses will play a major role in ramping up the ­distributions of vaccines before winter hits. CSL’s senior vice-president for manufacturing operations, Christopher Larkins, said on Tuesday the company was on schedule.

“We already have over a million doses in the fridge. I’m very happy with how we’ve been able to quickly jump on this accelerated production. I think we’ll be able to hit the million-a-week run rate within a matter of weeks,” he told the COVID-19 committee.

“We’re almost there now. The very first week of production, we have to do what’s called process qualification. During process qualification … deliberately, we make smaller batches.

“So I don’t think the first week’s production is a good representation of what we would be able to constantly make.”