Covid-19 vaccine campaign calls on star power
A celebrity advertising campaign will be used to promote take-up of the Covid-19 vaccine.
A celebrity advertising campaign will be used to promote take-up of the Covid-19 vaccine and the nation’s leading employers will write to 7 million workers asking them to get inoculated as the government and business work together to help pilot the pandemic recovery.
Leading business figures attending a roundtable meeting with Josh Frydenberg on Wednesday were informed by the co-ordinator of Australia’s vaccine program, Lieutenant General John Frewen, that a high-powered advertising campaign featuring a prominent celebrity was likely to commence when vaccine supply increased, probably by September.
The Treasurer and General Frewen on Wednesday chaired a meeting on how the corporate sector could help promote and partake in the vaccination rollout along with some of the country’s most senior corporate figures, including the chief executives from all four major banks, Qantas, Virgin Australia, Telstra, Optus, Wesfarmers and Woolworths.
The meeting also included the leaders from the country’s major peak bodies.
While an agreement was not struck on how vaccinations could be rolled out in workplaces, business leaders used the meeting to say they needed legal protection if they were to begin administering vaccines to their staff.
Mr Frydenberg said the industry groups and businesses at the meeting agreed to write to 7 million workers and ask them to get vaccinated.
“It was agreed by all members present that businesses will write to all their workers about the importance of being vaccinated and in some cases will be reaching out to the customer base,” Mr Frydenberg said.
“For example, Alan Joyce, CEO of Qantas, talked about how he has 13 million frequent flyers and over 22,000 workers.
“We heard from the Minerals Council how their businesses, their members, reach out into Indigenous communities in the remotest parts of Australia and how they are willing to work with us to get that message (out) about how important it is to vaccinate.
“There were many offers of premises for vaccinations being rolled out, including from Wesfarmers, that raised the opportunities that could be provided at the local Bunnings or local Officeworks.”
General Frewen said the government would consider workplace vaccinations as supplies of Pfizer and Moderna increased.
“GPs and hubs and state and territory clinics will remain the backbone of the plan. But I think as we get, especially into those later months of October, November, December, (with) the supply that we will have ... it will be really important for people to have a more diverse range of ways to access the vaccine,” he said.
“It will give us greater flexibility. It will give us greater choice and will give us greater convenience.”
Deputy Labor leader Richard Marles questioned why the meeting with business leaders did not happen earlier.
“Why on earth wasn’t this happening last year? I mean, we have known for a year – more – that to get to the other side of Covid-19 was going to be an exercise in vaccinating the population,” Mr Marles said.
“And yet it is only now that this kind of conversation is happening with a stakeholder that is obviously going to be really critical to it, in terms of business.”