David Gillespie (Lyne, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Australian Immunisation Register Amendment (Reporting) Bill 2020. We live in a wonderful country in Australia. All of us know that, but it's during this pandemic that people have a new-found appreciation of what they knew in their DNA. What a wonderful lottery we won when we were born or came to this country, because not only do we have the freedom of speech, association and travel—up until recently—we were gifted a wonderful public health system, clean water, and also a really good vaccination program.

A bit like the member for Dunkley, I remember lining up as a schoolkid getting jabs in the arm or getting a polio vaccine on a little spoon under the tongue. That was my first experience. When you look at the history of vaccination, it was one of the great public health initiatives around the world. So many illnesses that create great morbidity and suffering and even death have been modified by it.

With the pandemic, we've obviously had to ramp up a lot of systems, and utilising and improving on the existing Australian Immunisation Register is part of that response. As you know, there is a register that exists. Most people do have their vaccination history recorded on it, because it is a very handy public health measure to have both for your own personal medical history and for efficacy of producing herd immunity and protecting everyone from whatever the infectious disease is. With the COVID vaccine rollout, it's very important that we do maximise the efficacy of this and get all the providers of the vaccine to record it in this register so we can keep a track of who has been vaccinated and levels of vaccination to judge response, efficacy and all those sorts of things.

It's really important that people understand this data has been collected for some time. There is a very secure computer system that the government controls, and individuals have their privacy maintained with this system. It's not going to change. If we want to go to your immunisation history statement, you can print it out from Medicare online, myGov or the Express Plus Medicare mobile app. So it's controlled by you—only you and the government controlled computer record system. If you do not want that being in contact with you and you don't want lots of correspondence, you can inform the system. All the disclosure is at your control.

There are allowances in this legislation to make sure that the vaccine providers—not the manufacturers but the people delivering the service, whether it's going to be through a pharmacy, a hospital, a general practice or an outpatient clinic—record the vaccination, because, as you know, in the pandemic there will be two vaccinations. All the vaccines that are being rolled out in Australia require two injections.

So there's no ambiguity, I might say a few words about the current situation—lest I say, not controversy. I want to reiterate: one of the benefits I bring to this House and this parliament is using the knowledge from my extensive medical career, because a lot of this is very technical stuff. Vaccines have a long history of delivering massive public health benefits, and this vaccine program will do the same for the nation. Everything about this disease is evolving at such a rapid rate, but I want my constituents and my colleagues, both on the opposition benches and here, to know that I'll be lining up for my vaccine, like the member for Dunkley. When my turn comes, I'll be accepting a vaccine. Some of you are probably a whole lot healthier than me, so I'll be really welcoming receiving the vaccine. That is the best thing.

We are blessed that we've had a great response. We controlled our borders, which has protected us in a way that other countries weren't able to be. We've got a wonderful public health system—with contact tracing, managing outbreaks and getting our economy going again—and the vaccine program will be part of that. This bit of legislation is improving our existing systems, but it's important that when people get the vaccine they make sure it's recorded. You'll get the info when you're in hospital or when you're sick at other times in the years hence. It'll always be there for you to check and for your GP to see on your My Health Record and know what you've had. I commend this bill to the House.

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