Top adviser to Scott Morrison backs ‘no jab, no play’ for all

National COVID-19 Co-ordination Commissioner Jane Halton also warned against “vaccine nationalism”, saying the world may not be as united if a coronavirus vaccine is found.

COVID-19 Co-ordination Commissioner Jane Halton Jane Halton at the National Press Club in Canberra on Monday. Picture: AAP

One of Scott Morrison’s key advisers on the coronavirus has endorsed a “no jab, no play” policy for adults during the pandemic and encouraged the government to take similar action if Australians refuse any COVID-19 vaccine.

National COVID-19 Co-ordination Commissioner Jane Halton, the former secretary of the Department of Finance and the Department of Health, also warned against “vaccine nationalism”, saying she feared the world may not be as united if and when there is a coronavirus vaccine.

“The government has got a couple of tried and true mechanisms in terms of people who are not happy to be vaccinated. We talked about childcare … We’ve seen a couple of pretty prominent cases in the footballing world just at the moment,” Ms Halton told the National Press Club.

“Forget the ‘no jab, no play’ for kids, it’s now ‘no jab, no play’ for adults — and I would support that.

“There are some people for a variety of health-related reasons, they cannot be vaccinated. Everybody else, as far as I’m concerned, should actually step up and do the right thing.”

The Queensland government has announced a ban on interstate NRL players who have refused a flu shot for ethical or religious reasons.

Ms Halton said her support for “no jab, no play” was limited to what actions had been taken. She said she did not want to speculate on future government policy responses and what they could look like.

However, she added: “I would encourage government to continue to take those sorts of decisions. And can I just say, here and now, the term that I really object to in this space is people who say that they ‘conscientiously object’ to vaccination. Actually, unless you’ve got a good health reason, you’re a vaccine refuser.”

If a coronavirus vaccine became available, which was a “reasonable chance”, Ms Halton predicted there would be a “stampede” in Australia to get immunised.

As premiers clash over border openings, Ms Halton said she was not convinced restricting internal borders was the “right way to manage our risks”.

NSW has pushed for all border closures to urgently be lifted, while Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania cautioned against moving too quickly,

“This is obviously a difficult issue at the moment and people are taking a fairly conservative approach to issues around borders,” Ms Halton said.

“One of the things that I think we do need to understand is that our economy doesn’t work in hermetically sealed spheres. And within the bounds of what is sensible, from a medical and other perspective, enabling businesses to move products around, enabling workers — to the extent that they can safely — to return to work, including if that means travelling across borders, I think is a sensible thing to do.

“I understand why people are nervous, but I would encourage people to think about how we maintain control, perhaps while enabling business to operate.”

Ms Halton is also chair of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovation, which is working to ensure poorer countries get access to a coronavirus vaccine and not just those that might develop the treatment or those with the deepest pockets.

CEPI is supporting 10 vaccine candidates, with one that could be trialled on humans as early as July. There are 130 groups working on a vaccine worldwide.

“If we have vaccine nationalism, and one country looks after itself first at the expense of the rest of the world, everyone is going to continue to suffer,” Ms Halton said.

“What are you doing if there is a vaccine produced in your country by your company? What share of that is going to vulnerable people around the world at the same time? At the moment, we’re all in it together.

“As soon as there is a vaccine, I fear that we will maybe not be quite all in it as together as we have been.”

Deputy chief medical officer Paul Kelly said he did no support compulsory vaccination but he was sure there would be a “very strong uptake” of a coronavirus vaccine.

“There’s always a pocket of people that are against vaccinations. What I’ve found, though, in these sort of circumstances where there has been death and severe illness, people are much more attuned to getting the vaccine than previously,” Professor Kelly said.

“We’ve noticed, for example, almost double the number of flu vaccines have been delivered and injected already in this year compared with last year.”