MONIQUE WRIGHT:
Well, health authorities are urging people to get their booster shot as soon as possible. Lieutenant General John Frewen is in charge of the nation's vaccine taskforce and had his third jab yesterday. He joins us now. Good morning to you, Lieutenant. Thanks so much for being with us.
Look, as much as we don't want to see outbreaks, how much do you actually think that the current outbreak, particularly in New South Wales, will help in terms of people having that third dose?
JOHN FREWEN:
Yeah. Hi Monique. It's been our experience that outbreaks do encourage people to get along, to get vaccinated. But you've just heard, though, the, the vaccination rates in New South Wales are absolutely fantastic - up over 90 per cent fully vaccinated. We're now at 80 per cent fully vaccinated across all of the states and territories, so these are really tremendous numbers and it's been really great how people have responded. But now it's about boosters as well. And for anybody who's due for their booster, I really encourage them to get in and get the booster done as well.
MONIQUE WRIGHT:
So can people get a booking before they're at that five month mark?
JOHN FREWEN:
You can get on the site now and get yourself booked in ahead of time. But you can also do walk-ins. I mean, I went to a pharmacy, a community pharmacy, yesterday, and that was just fantastic - they're pumping people through. So there's a lot of convenience out there as well. But again, people, you know, if they're due I really encourage them to, to get it done.
MONIQUE WRIGHT:
Okay. Early teething problems that we, we had with the rollout of the vaccine, has that all been ironed out? Particularly now, because we've got five to 11 year olds being able to get their jabs from early next year, and then everyone their boosters.
JOHN FREWEN:
Yeah. So look, the, the early days, a lot of that was about supply, and we had sort of limited amounts of supply that we were having to, to allocate very carefully. There's absolutely no concerns with supply now. We've now got more than 10,500 places across the country where you can go and get vaccinated. I mentioned pharmacies, there's almost 3,500 pharmacies across the country. You know, there's plenty of ways to get vaccinated. There's no issue with choice of which vaccine that you want to take. So it's easier than it ever has been to get vaccinated.
So again, if people haven't had their first and second dose, really strongly encourage that, because that's the most important thing. But now, you know, we're very much shifting on to, to boosters as a priority, so we'll get as many people through as we can. We had just shy of 100,000 people get their boosters yesterday, so I expect to see those numbers continue to rise.
MONIQUE WRIGHT:
Yeah. It's a good thing, isn't it? And just quickly, how will the rollout for children getting their first immunisation, How will that roll out?
JOHN FREWEN:
Yeah. So look, we're, we're on track to get that started early January. We expect to, you know, of course GPs, pharmacies will be the mainstay of the program, as they have been. But we're working with the states and territories as well to see what sort of pathways there might be through their resources as well. But again, we'll, everything will be in place, and hopefully will give- every child will have a chance to get their first dose before they get back to school next year.
MONIQUE WRIGHT:
Yes. Lieutenant John Frewen, you are a busy man, and we really appreciate your time this morning. Thank you so much.
JOHN FREWEN:
Thanks, Mon.
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