Up to 30 Indigenous communities across Australia could receive a rapid increase in coronavirus vaccinations in an attempt to drive up poor immunization rates.
The national rollout has been criticized for leaving Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people behind despite being in a high-priority group in the six-month-old program.
According to the Federal Department of Health, as of 31 August 2021, 35.7% of the wider population of Australians, aged 16 and above, are fully vaccinated whilst 59.6% have received one dose.
However, only 21.3% of Indigenous Australians, aged 15 and up, are fully vaccinated and only 38.7% have received their first dose.
Some remote communities’ rates are as low as 7%.
PLANNED ACCELERATION
Vaccine rollout co-ordinator, Lieutenant General John Frewen, has nominated 10 remote and 20 non-remote communities to be involved but will not reveal their location before showing national cabinet.
“The list at the moment are the communities where there are the greatest gap between the current national first-dose, second-dose vaccination rates,” he told a Senate committee.
Senior Aboriginal leader Pat Turner and the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation’s Dawn Spence have worked on the plan.
The proposed acceleration would involve community leaders and Indigenous ambassadors over the next four weeks.
Lt Gen Frewen also reassured that a specific communications strategy would be designed to address and combat vaccine hesitancy.
He said western NSW – where emergency teams were deployed to after an outbreak infected Indigenous people – provided a blueprint.
“We have been making up some very good ground over at least the last month but you can see there is a gap,” he said.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison agreed with Turner that Indigenous vaccination rates needed to be as high as possible. However, PM Morrison noted that there were no simple solutions.
He does not believe lower coverage should “disable” Australia from easing restrictions when the time comes that 70 to 80% of the wider population are vaccinated.
