Coronavirus: Scott Morrison opens Covid vaccines to under-40s

The PM warns he will not ‘countenance’ an increase in Covid-19 deaths as a result of further opening up the economy.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks to the media after Monday’s national cabinet meeting.

Australians under 40 are now able to join the vaccine rollout and get the AstraZeneca jab, as Scott ­Morrison warns he will not “countenance” an increase in Covid-19 deaths as a result of further opening up the economy.

After a meeting of national cabinet, the Prime Minister ­revealed doctors would be offered indemnity for giving vaccines to anyone under 60, paving the way for more adults to get vaccinated if they were willing to take on the small risk of a blood clot.

Mr Morrison also revealed a plan for compulsory vaccination for aged care workers by ­September.

The Prime Minister said on Monday night that under-40s – who are currently not part of the rollout nationally – will be able to ask their GPs about getting the ­AstraZeneca jab.

“If they are willing to go and speak to their doctor and have ­access to the AstraZeneca vaccine, they can do so. So the answer is yes, they can go and do that,” Mr Morrison said.

“We will be implementing a new no-fault indemnity scheme for general practitioners who ­administer Covid-19 vaccines. So this relates to encouraging Australians to go and check in to their GP about the vaccination.”

As countries such as Singapore and Britain prepare to open and drop many Covid-19 restrictions, Mr Morrison said the nation should not accept the levels of deaths seen in countries with very high vaccination rates.

However, he said he expected more international arrivals later this year to address skills shortages and as foreign students returned.

“Even as the UK is finding with an 80 per cent vaccinated population, they’re not there either ­because they’ve got over 100 people dying every week,” Mr Morrison said. “And so that’s not a situation that I’m prepared to countenance.

“And one of the reasons why Australia is in such a unique position compared to the rest of the world is Covid is riddled through all of those countries.

“Their opportunity to ensure that the absolutely calamitous ­impact of this virus and the new strains doesn’t impact on them is much more limited than here in Australia, because of the success we’ve had to date. It would be unwise to surrender that advantage at this point and preferably at no point.”

Federal vaccine rollout chief John Frewen said on Monday that Australians needed to become comfortable with the prospect of public health measures being in place for years. But on Monday night, the Prime Minister said that, while there were “uncertainties”, he could foresee quarantine ­arrangements for vaccinated people changing at some point next year. “We will continue to gather the evidence and continue to prepare our plans for how we can have Australia living with this virus in the future in a way that minimises the restrictions upon them,” Mr Morrison said.

The Singapore government on Monday announced that it would no longer release daily Covid-19 infection numbers, would ditch quarantine for returned travellers, and would no longer require positive cases to isolate.

Many jurisdictions in the US are beginning to roll back Covid-19 mask and gathering rules ahead of President Joe Biden’s July 4 deadline to open up the country.

And in Britain, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak said on Monday he would not accept any delays to the end of pandemic ­restrictions due on July 19.

As state and territory governments announced further ­restrictions, NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian and her Victorian counterpart, Daniel Andrews, were critical of the federal government’s vaccine rollout, while Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk called for a reduction in international arrivals.

Lieutenant-General Frewen said Australians should expect public health measures to be in place for years. “We will be living with Covid for many years, not just many months and weeks. And I think all of these measures we can expect to see activated and then deactivated as we become more comfortable with the outbreak,” he said. “We will have to get more comfortable with the idea that there will be ongoing outbreaks in the Covid space.”

As of Monday, Australia had 271 active cases with 23 local cases recorded in the past 24 hours, ­according to the latest national Covid snapshot.

The bulk of the cases were the 18 new infections recorded in NSW, with community-transmitted cases also found in Western Australia, the Northern Territory and Queensland.

More than seven million Australians had received at least one dose of a Covid-19 vaccine as of Monday, with 48,346 jabs given on Sunday. More than 426,811 doses have been handed out in aged and disability care centres, but the federal government does not yet publicly reveal how many workers in that sector have been vaccinated.

Leaked data reported over the weekend suggested two-thirds of aged care workers – 88,000 out of 263,000 people – had not received a vaccine.

Northern Territory Chief Minister Michael Gunner extended the snap lockdown of the Darwin region until Friday after the Northern Territory recorded a new case.

Indigenous Australians Minister Ken Wyatt said he was gravely concerned about the spread of the Delta strain at the Granites gold mine in the Territory due to its proximity to some “significant communities”, while many ­Indigenous people remained ­unvaccinated.

Mr Wyatt said that, in one community near the mine, only 18 out of 400 people had been ­vaccinated.

Ms Palaszczuk said southeast Queensland was “on the verge” of lockdown and one unlinked case would trigger stay-at-home ­orders, after two new locally transmitted cases were detected on Monday.

Less than 24 hours after the state’s borders were slammed shut to the rest of Australia, South ­Australian Premier Steven Marshall reinstated caps on hospitality, limiting venues to one person per two square metres, mandatory face masks in high-risk zones, and maximum private gatherings of 150 people. South Australia did not record any new cases on Monday.

Ms Berejiklian said the vaccine rollout must lean more heavily on the GP network, but her government could not control the vaccine supply.

“I have been calling on this for weeks and weeks if not months,” the NSW Premier said.

“Our GPs want to do more. They want more doses and they want more GPs to come online.”