Vaccine hesitancy falls as Covid case numbers soar and lockdowns drag on

But Queensland and Western Australia are dragging the chain on vaccinations and are likely to delay reopening of the economy.

Vaccine hesitancy has fallen across all states over the past three months. Picture: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images

Vaccine hesitancy has eased due to rising Covid-19 infections and prolonged lockdowns in NSW, Victoria and the ACT, as a record number of Australians seek inoculation from the highly infectious Delta strain.

According to a fortnightly tracking poll obtained by The Australian from the Melbourne Institute, measured hesitancy was 20.3 per cent last week, compared with 21.8 per cent a fortnight earlier.

In mid-May before virus outbreaks in Victoria, the vaccine hesitancy tracker was at over 35 per cent, while women are now just as likely as men to accept Covid-19 vaccination.

The proportion of people who were unsure about receiving a vaccine dropped to 8.6 per cent last week, while 11.7 per cent were unwilling to be vaccinated, a figure that’s been steady for the past month.

But hesitancy is creeping up in NSW, where Greater Sydney is in the ninth week of lockdown, rising to 18 per cent last week from 17.3 per cent a fortnight earlier and 14.6 per cent in late July.

In NSW, 11.8 per cent are now unwilling to be vaccinated, up from 7.6 per cent a month earlier, although only 6.2 per cent says they are unsure about a jab.

The Melbourne Institute tracker shows South Australia has the highest rate of vaccine hesitancy at 23 per cent, while at 13.4 per cent Queensland has the highest proportion of respondents who say flat out they are not willing to be vaccinated.

On Wednesday, while NSW reported a new daily high of 919 cases, Gladys Berejiklian stressed the key figure is vaccination uptake rather than infection numbers.

The NSW Premier said she wanted to see case numbers go down but “we have made the point that the most important figure moving forward is the rate of vaccination”.

“As soon as we have all those milestones, we will have those extra freedoms,” Ms Berejiklian said, foreshadowing an announcement of easing in restrictions as early as Thursday.

NSW has administered 775,000 vaccine doses in the past seven days and has the least hesitant population in the nation.

On Tuesday, NSW passed the ACT to record the nation’s highest proportion of eligible population with at least a first vaccine dose.

More than 4 million people in NSW have had their first vaccine shot, or 61.5 per cent of those in the state aged over 15, and almost one-third are now fully vaccinated.

The Melbourne Institute said vaccine hesitancy has fallen in all other large states, apart from Western Australia, where there was a slight increase to 22.4 per cent.

WA and Queensland have the lowest vaccination rates in the nation, with over half their eligible populations unvaccinated.

Only 47 per cent of West Australians aged over 15 have received a first dose, while 28.5 per cent are fully vaccinated.

On Wednesday Scott Morrison said WA and Queensland’s lagging vaccination rates were due in part to “very low case numbers and so people don’t feel the same compulsion to get vaccinated”.

But the Prime Minister said the national plan of “living with Covid” when 70 per cent and 80 per cent of people were inoculated “will actually encourage those vaccination rates”.

“What is needed for the health and safety of people right across the country, whether they’re in Tasmania or NSW, Queensland, Western Australia, is getting the population vaccinated, and the national plan provides the incentives, which says you get vaccinated, then you’re able to open up the country,” Mr Morrison said.

According to the institute’s fortnightly tracking survey of 1200 adults, women have generally been more hesitant than men, but this gap is now virtually closed.

In early July, 30 per cent of women were hesitant compared to 23 per cent for men. After last week’s survey, this has now fallen substantially for women to 20.5 per cent and to 20 per cent for men.