Thursday, 16 September 2021

COVID-19 vaccinations

Mr BLACKWOOD (Narracan)

Recently an anomaly in the COVID directions was changed so that people could not travel outside Melbourne metro to regional towns to access COVID vaccination.

It is now not permitted for people to travel outside their own area for vaccination. Prior to this change it was discovered that people were travelling from hotspot areas in Melbourne after booking a vaccination in country Victoria using a loophole in the directions.

This was impacting on the ability of country people to get a vaccine and put country people at great risk of being infected with the delta variant.

However, another oversight by the CHO, when he issued directions to country vaccination centres not to book in people from Melbourne metro, means that residents on the fringes of regional areas who would normally travel to their regional centre to shop and access medical services are now not able to access a vaccine from the regional vaccination centre or their regular GP.

I have written to Dr Sutton and he has agreed to review this anomaly. However, in the meantime hundreds of residents in Garfield, Bunyip, Nar Nar Goon and Tynong have had their appointments for vaccination cancelled.

This is another example of how stupid it is to have the small farming communities to the north, east and south of Nar Nar Goon included as part of Melbourne metro.

I have been calling for common sense on this classification of these towns and areas for over 18 months. Nothing has happened, despite the Chief Health Officer agreeing to review it back in May last year.

Now it is having a very serious impact on the ability of residents in these areas to protect themselves and others around them from COVID infection.

The farming areas on the fringe of Melbourne metro must be reclassified as regional.