Looking for a fight Hunt counters Andrews criticism of vaccine carve up

By Rachel EddieUpdated September 7, 2021 â€" 3.54pmfirst published at 9.52am

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has accused the federal government of providing NSW with more vaccine doses than it was entitled to, reducing Victorians to “some sort of egg and spoon thing” in the national race to hit vaccine targets.

On Tuesday, Mr Andrews joined West Australian Premier Mark McGowan in calling for greater transparency, arguing there had been “secret allocations” to NSW.

Victoria had agreed to NSW receiving extra doses of Pfizer that arrived from Poland, but Mr Andrews claimed allocations went above and beyond what Victoria was informed of.

An analysis of the vaccine rollout by ABC’s 7.30 on Monday night found NSW’s share had increased to 45 per cent of the nation’s doses compared with 32 per cent in June.

“Some don’t like to see this as a race, but a race it surely is. What I didn’t know was that Premier Berejiklian is in a sprint, while the rest of us are supposed to do some sort of egg and spoon thing.”

“I signed up to a national plan to vaccinate the country, not a plan to vaccinate Sydney.”

‘What I didn’t know was that Premier Berejiklian is in a sprint, while the rest of us are supposed to do some sort of egg and spoon thing.’

Premier Daniel Andrews

Mr Andrews urged federal Health Minister Greg Hunt to explain what he described as a “secret” and “under the table” arrangement.

Mr Hunt dismissed the criticism at an afternoon press conference, saying Victoria had received a higher per capita vaccine allocation than NSW and that “some people are looking for a fight”.

“The critical thing here is to save lives and protect lives,” Mr Hunt said. “It would be almost unimaginable not to be providing the support ... to those most in need at their time of greatest need.”

“As we have had outbreaks, we have prioritised those areas to save lives. In particular, we started with prioritising Victoria when there was a Victorian outbreak.”

Mr Hunt said the country had an “abundance of doses” of the Pfizer vaccine coming in, thanks to swap deals with Singapore and the UK totalling 4.5 million doses.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said extra vaccines had been provided to Victoria and Queensland as well as NSW, dismissing criticism of the vaccine distribution to the states.

He said he “doesn’t share the view” of Mr Andrews, adding that Victoria had had doses brought forward as well as NSW, while other states had not.

The political stoush comes as Victoria recorded 246 new local COVID-19 cases for the second day in a row on Tuesday.

Ninety of the new cases have been linked to existing outbreaks and patients, but it is not yet known how many cases were in isolation for their entire infectious period.

The remaining 156 cases are under investigation.

Health authorities said 43,858 test results were received and another 32,300 people received a dose of a COVID-19 vaccine at state-run clinics.

There are now 1786 active cases in the state.

Teen on ventilator in Victorian hospital

Mr Andrews also revealed that a 17-year-old in need of a ventilator was among the 110 Victorians in hospital.

Thirty people are in intensive care and 14 are on a ventilator.

“The age range of those ventilated patients is 17 years of age through to 76 years of age and there are people in their 40s, 50s, 60s [and] in between,” Mr Andrews said at Victoria’s daily COVID-19 press conference.

“Anyone can fall ill to this, anyone can fall seriously ill to this virus. That’s why we all have to work so hard.”

Mr Andrews reinforced the message that Victorians should not be waiting for a particular brand of vaccine, with 11,400 AstraZeneca appointments available this week.

The state will expand its vaccine program with an additional 40,000 appointments weekly at state hubs and a 50 per cent increase in capacity at some sites.

People queue to be vaccinated at the Royal Exhibition Building in Carlton at the weekend.Credit:Joe Armao

Some 61.4 per cent of Victorians have now received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and the state is expected to beat its target of vaccinating 1 million people over a five-week period.

“We are ahead of schedule, so it looks like we will beat that,” Mr Andrews said.

There were 59,000 bookings made yesterday, including by senior students.

Victoria ‘plodding’ on vaccination rates: Matthew Guy

Newly appointed Victorian Opposition Leader Matthew Guy said the state was “plodding along” when it came to COVID-19 vaccination rates and that it deserved its fair share of the national vaccination stock based on a per-capita share.

He urged the Andrews government to spend more money convincing people to get the vaccine so Victoria could reach desired vaccine targets.

With Angus Livingston, Annika Smethurst and Michaela Whitbourn

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