These are the twin measurements of successful Covid management. That is exactly what this graphic does, recording vaccination percentage of the entire population on the X axis, and deaths per million on the Y axis.
We all know that Australia has done well minimising deaths from COVID-19 since the beginning of the pandemic. Notwithstanding recent outbreaks in NSW and Victoria, we still rank as the third most successful country in this respect, with just 73 deaths per million head of population. Only New Zealand (seven per million) and South Korea (59 per million) have done better.
But what about vaccination rates? Domestic political sparing over recent months has focused heavily on our so-called “botched” vaccination rollout, with claims it would be an important issue come election time.
While Australia did start slowly and was right back at the tail end of developed nations to begin with, we now rank 16th out of 37, with nearly 70 per cent of the total population having had two jabs. We have shot past countries that only a few months ago were well ahead of us: nations such as Britain, Germany, Israel and the US. And we are likely to climb even further up the ranking in the weeks and months ahead.
So there can be little doubt that on the international stage Australia lines up pretty well with its pandemic management. Perhaps Scott Morrison was right to focus on minimising casualties before turning his attention to maximising vaccination rates.
We are well on our way to successfully achieve on both fronts.
The other criteria for judging successful pandemic management is how the economy has fared. That isn’t reflected in this graphic, but can be summed up by pointing to how quickly Australian economic growth bounced back after the recession, and how low unemployment has remained despite lockdowns – even though it did rise this week. In both respects Australia is again doing well on the global stage.
With an election just around the corner, whatever you think of the prime Minister personally, he can’t be accused of failing Australia during Covid. The data points we are looking at here suggest quite the opposite.
Peter van Onselen is a professor of politics and public policy at the University of Western Australia and Griffith University.
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How do you compare how well or badly nations have done during the Covid crisis? The two most important statistics to compare OECD countries are death rates within populations and vaccinations rates. The benefits of fewer deaths is obvious; higher vaccination rates means less risk of death and serious illness into the future.