Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services) Share this | Hansard source

(—) (): One of the things that we've seen here in Australia, and around the world, and one of the things that we've been concerned about as the pandemic has continued to progress is the impact of the virus on the unvaccinated. I know when I was in Japan earlier in the year the reporting out of the US, that I saw on a daily basis, was that in the United States it was becoming very much a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Somewhere between 90 per cent and 95 per cent of those in hospital suffering severe symptoms of COVID-19 were actually unvaccinated. Some figures out of New South Wales earlier this year indicated that similar proportions, 90 per cent to 95 per cent of those in hospital with severe illness, severe symptoms of the virus, were unvaccinated. The data is very clear. It shows up in the circumstances of the most vulnerable, in this country, that the vaccine works. (Time expired)