Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

[by video link] I'll ask the Minister for Health and Aged Care to add to my answer. The assertion made by the member regarding the cohort she's referred to as being a priority vaccination cohort is not the advice of the SITAG advisory panel, led by Professor Murphy. It is not the advice of the Chief Medical Officer. The priority cohort groups of people were set out in the national vaccination strategy, which went through the national cabinet and went through our own cabinet last year. Those priorities were set by the medical professionals advising the Commonwealth—and not just those medical advisers but also the chief health officers of all the states and territories. We have been following that medical advice, and that is what has driven that strategy.

And so it is to date that, of the more vulnerable populations—those in residential aged care—100 per cent of residential aged-care facilities have had that first dose offered, and 99 per cent have had the second dose offered, and that will soon be completed with both doses. The population aged over 70, also the most vulnerable population, has a vaccination of more than two-thirds.

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