Vaccine ‘beginning of the end’ of COVID
Priority patients in Victoria received their first COVID-19 jabs on Monday across five different sites in the state.
Melbourne’s Austin Hospital was one of five centres in the state to start vaccinating healthcare workers and quarantine staff on Monday, marking the “beginning of the end” of Australia’s battle with the coronavirus.
The Austin’s clinical lead for COVID vaccinations, Janine Trevillyan, said up to 50 people were to receive the jab on Monday but efforts would be scaled up in coming weeks.
“We will be starting slower today to make sure the systems work OK and that everything’s going well, which it really has done this morning so we are happy,” Dr Trevillyan said.
“Once it is really up to speed, it will do around 350 people a day … and then in the next couple of weeks we will be opening a much larger clinic at our repatriation hospital and it will be about 10,000 doses a week.”
Staff at the hospital in Melbourne’s northeast were thrilled, Dr Trevillyan said. “None of us wants to work in a COVID ward again, none of us wants to watch our staff mates end up in intensive care,” she said.
Grace Gibney, associate nurse unit manager of COVID-19 screening services, was one of the first healthcare workers to receive the vaccine.
“We use a lot of PPE and infection-control measures but having the vaccine just gives me a bit of relief that I have got a bit more protection to confidently be out in the community and spend time with my grandparents. I just feel a bit safer,” the 25-year-old said.
“There is still a long way to go … but I think (the vaccine) is the light at the end of the tunnel and we are on the right road to getting back to normality.”
Health Minister Martin Foley said he wanted to make sure the program would return life as close to normal and make sure “this is the beginning of the end of this global pandemic here”.
Today marks day 1 of the Victorian rollout of the Commonwealth Government’s COVID-19 Vaccination Program. Grace helps run the Austin Hospital's COVID-19 screening clinic & was one of the first high-risk workers to get vaccinated today. Info: https://t.co/4MQwgkdgTu#COVID19Vicpic.twitter.com/xCtL2ajZjx
— VicGovDH (@VicGovDH) February 22, 2021
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