Well, it’s wonderful to be here in downtown Boonah this morning, making a significant announcement, not only for Boonah but for regional Australia.
This morning, we are flanked by some incredible men that have joined the fight against COVID-19 in regional Australia. This morning we’ll be announcing that regional pharmacies, in particular Footes Pharmacy right here in Boonah, will as of today, be able to hand out the vaccines for over 50s, for the AstraZeneca.
Now, I’m joined here by the Minister for Regional Health and Regional Communications, Mark Coulton. Thank you for joining us.
It’s always wonderful to have you in the electorate doing amazing things.
Cameron Foote, the local pharmacist – who has a number of pharmacies. Cameron, thank you for being a part of this exciting rollout and joining with us, locked arms, to take the fight up against COVID-19.
And of course, Chris Owen, the Pharmacy Guild President here to make the announcement. I might just ask Mark Coulton now to give you a bit of an oversight of what the program’s about.
MARK COULTON:
Thanks, Scotty. Great to be here in Boonah, your home town with the Assistant Minister Scott Buchholz.
And so what we’re announcing today is a partnership between the Federal Government, the Queensland Government and the Pharmacy Guild.
This site here behind us, Cameron Foote’s pharmacy, Foote’s Pharmacy, will be the first site of 49 pharmacies across Queensland that will be distributing AstraZeneca starting from today.
These pharmacies are located in areas where there is not a GP delivering the service.
So, community pharmacy are filling in the gap. And it’s a great choice because people need to have confidence in the people delivering vaccinations.
With what has happened in the last six months, there is a lot of questions people have about whether they should have the vaccine or not.
And there are not many more trusted professions in a community than their local pharmacist.
So I’m pleased that this announcement’s been made today.
We’re very hopeful that in other parts of Queensland, but also in other states, we will be able to roll out the vaccine program with the Pharmacy Guild across Australia because they are a very important partner with the Australian Government because of their close connection to the community.
But I might hand on now to Chris to say a few words and then happy to take questions at the end.
CHRIS OWEN:
Thank you, Mark. It is a pleasure today to be able to announce that 49 community pharmacies in Queensland will be able to give the COVID-19 vaccine.
State Health Minister Yvette D’Ath, Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt, we thank you for being able to join in this COVID rollout.
We want to accelerate the amount of numbers that are being given, and especially in rural and remote Australia, where I myself am from. And we want to be able to lower those barriers to access for those patients to get in this COVID vaccine rollout.
We look forward to further pharmacies being rolled out in the future and we’ll hopefully be able to get back to our normal daily lives sooner rather than later.
CAMERON FOOTE:
Thanks, Chris. Welcome to Boonah, everyone. Really excited to be part of the rollout today, improving access for people in rural and remote areas. Pharmacies are excited to come off the bench and get involved in the fight against COVID. Thanks very much for coming, everyone.
MARK COULTON:
So we can take any questions that you might have.
QUESTION:
Fantastic. Minister, just a couple of questions in relation to, same thing there, just about you got any idea what sort of timeframes we may be able to seek supplies to roll it out further?
MARK COULTON:
Look, I think towards the end of the year, we’ll see more. We secured an extra 20 million Pfizer doses on top of the 20 million we secured earlier in the year.
And so they’re sort of back ended in the last quarter of the year.
But I would expect that we’ll see a gradual roll out. And then when we get to go in the below 50s, so the general population, we’ll see larger numbers.
Queensland’s been very good. You know, they started doing sort of town-wide vaccination clinics some time ago in some of the smaller, remote communities. And so, as the vaccine supply increases, so will the opportunity for people to have vaccine.
QUESTION:
You’ve got AstraZeneca here. Pfizer, will that come to?
MARK COULTON:
Pfizer, eventually. There is a few more logistical problems with Pfizer, but not insurmountable.
It can be transported at the minus 70 that it’s stored at. Once it’s thawed back to around 4 degrees and below, it can sit in a vaccine fridge for five days.
So they’re working through the logistics now of getting more Pfizer doses out as we’re getting to that phase of the rollout.
UNKNOWN:
Last question.
QUESTION:
Good to see the Queensland Premier getting her jab today.
MARK COULTON:
Oh, is she? Yeah. Well I had mine on Saturday, my wife and I who’s with me, had ours on Saturday.
We’re still upright and smiling. The clinic we were at, people were keen to have it. And I think that, particularly country people, understand that while country towns have probably been the safest place on the planet over the last 18 months, what’s made us safe, also makes us vulnerable.
And so we are focusing on getting regional areas done, particularly some of the more remote rural and Indigenous communities, because that would be incredibly difficult to manage it in those places. And those folk are really stepping up and taking the opportunity.
QUESTION:
Speaking of vulnerable, we can be very vulnerable. Take Victoria, you know, another 11 cases overnight. At a click of the fingers, Queensland could be in trouble.
MARK COULTON:
Everyone could be. And I think one of the reasons that the rollout was a little slower than we would have liked is probably complacency that people thought that the pandemic was something that was really happening somewhere else.
And to put it in perspective, if we had the same death rate as Europe here in Australia, we would have lost 30,000 people. And we’ve lost under a thousand.
So, yeah, they were tragic deaths, but it could have been worse. But I think what we’ve seen with the lockdown in Victoria, we are seeing a much greater focus on the public that this is serious.
It can affect us. Someone could roll into a town like here in Boonah and before you know it, we’ve got a lockdown here in Queensland.
And so we don’t want that, and the best way to prevent that is for people to step up and have their vaccine when they can make an appointment.
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