Pace picks up as second COVID-19 vaccine phase under way

Thousands of people received COVID-19 vaccines at GP clinics around the country on the first day of Phase 1B of the rollout.

Darius Googe is inoculated by Onyinyechi Okorie at the mass vaccine centre in Melbourne’s Royal Exhibition Building. Picture: Jason Edwards

Thousands of people received COVID-19 vaccines at GP clinics around the country on the first day of Phase 1B of the rollout, as Victoria began inoculating high-priority patients at mass vaccination centres.

About 1000 GP clinics have now received vaccine allocations and on Monday began inoculating the elderly, healthcare workers and those with an underlying health condition.

While the vaccine rollout has initially started with relatively small allocations to GP practices, Health Minister Greg Hunt said the number of jabs would ramp up to one million a day during the later stages of Phase 1B.

Doctor Lyn Robertson was the first patient to receive an AstraZeneca shot at the Northbridge Medical Practice in Sydney. Apart from protecting her from contracting COVID-19, Dr Robertson said the added benefit of being vaccinated was being able to travel internationally once borders open. Many airlines have said travellers will need to prove they have been vaccinated.

“That’s the main reason for me,” Dr Robertson said. “That and obviously protection from the virus. Hopefully we’ll get herd immunity if everybody has the vaccine.”

Northbridge Medical Practice has been allocated 400 doses a week and expects to be able to vaccinate 80 people a day in the initial stages of the 1B rollout. Surgeries’ dose allocations will increase as more supply becomes available. Locally manufactured doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine are expected to become available within the next couple of days after the Therapeutic Goods Administration completes testing.

Some 281,000 jabs have now been administered nationwide.

Victoria’s efforts to vaccinate its population received a boost on Monday with the opening of a mass vaccination centre in the Royal Exhibition Building, one of four mass centres that will operate in the state.

About 100 emergency service workers were the first to receive the COVID-19 vaccine in the Royal Exhibition Building on Monday in an operation that was co-ordinated by St Vincent’s private hospital. It’s the second time the building has been used as a makeshift hospital during a pandemic in its history.

“It (was) a really exciting ­moment because it marks the start of what we think is hope for our community,” St Vincent’s chief Angela Nolan said.

Ambulance service workers, firefighters and police were among the group who received their dose of the AstraZeneca ­vaccine on Monday in the building’s Great Hall.

It is the same part of the building which was used in 1919 to house patients who contracted the Spanish flu when the hospital system became overwhelmed.

A “soft launch” of another mass vaccination centre — at the Melbourne Exhibition and Convention Centre — also took place on Monday.

Two other high-volume Victorian centres are already open — at Heidelberg Repatriation Hospital, and Sunshine Hospital.