The Hon. Greg Hunt MP
Minister for Health and Aged Care
TRANSCRIPT
2 July 2021
INTERVIEW WITH DAVID LIPSON
ABC PM
E&OE…
Topics: COVID-19 Vaccine Rollout
DAVID LIPSON:
Well joining me now is the Health Minister Greg Hunt. Thank you very much for joining us on the program.
GREG HUNT:
Pleasure.
DAVID LIPSON:
The Government is getting independent modelling to guide its four phase plan. When will that modelling be completed and will it be publicly released?
GREG HUNT:
As ever we have always shared these things with the public. Right now, we have already got early work in relation to the Alpha strain and now we are looking at the Delta or the Indian strain, the Alpha was known as the UK strain. The Delta is clearly becoming the dominant strain in much of the world.
We are expecting to get that over the course of the next month. The Doherty Institute, which is based in Melbourne and is in fact one of the world’s leading modelling institutions, with some of the most extraordinary capabilities, is doing that work.
What does that mean for Australians? It means that there are four phases to progressively returning to normal. The vaccination phase, the post-vaccination phase, where we start to lift restrictions for people who have been vaccinated and the Prime Minister has worked very hard. I talked about this road map, I think back on Mother’s Day in early May. Now we are getting to that road map.
Then the consolidation phase, where we are really trying to exempt vaccinated residents from all domestic restrictions and allow full and significant travel and then the final phase where we are allowing uncapped inbound arrivals for all vaccinated persons without quarantine.
This is that sense of direction. Obviously it is an incentive for people to be vaccinated but it is also a recognition that as we lift those rates, Australians will be safer.
DAVID LIPSON:
As you say, it is a sense of direction but it doesn’t really give us any clearer timeline on when we will start moving back to quote, normal.
Why release details of this plan today without that modelling because some would say it looks like a distraction from the scrappy debate over AstraZeneca this week and the divisions of National Cabinet?
GREG HUNT:
This week we have seen two consecutive days of record vaccinations, 161,000 yesterday and 163,000 today and so we are actually seeing the Australian public step forward and AstraZeneca has been the backbone of that, even in the last 24 hours, 92,000 of the 163,000 vaccinations were AstraZeneca with very high numbers of people coming forward for second doses.
All of these things are part of it, this is the next step. That is the way in a COVID world, where the whole globe is responding to new circumstances, indeed with 8,300 lives lost in the last 24 hours.
You have to do this in terms of progressive stages and be open with the Australian public, in saying here are the fundamentals of the plan, the numbers should be guided by the health modelling and that is the next part to be completed, already under way and then that provides guidance, direction and a real sense of incentive for Australians.
And it comes as we have had record tests and record vaccinations on each of the last two days. Today, we will have passed eight million vaccinations in Australia and Australians are really stepping forward. It is about hope, it’s about certainty and about direction.
DAVID LIPSON:
As we heard from Professor Blakely there, we would need fewer vaccinations if we were willing to accept mask wearing, for example on public transport, even during low times of COVID in the community. Are various scenarios like that being modelled?
GREG HUNT:
So we are looking at a range of options and this is with the modellers at the moment, so I won’t pre-empt or constrain them.
DAVID LIPSON:
Is that one of the ones you are looking at?
GREG HUNT:
I won’t go into specifics, precisely because what they are doing is in an unconstrained way of working through all of the options.
What we see, we know that we actually have rings of containment in Australia. Sometimes people have said it has to be just one thing or others, but if you think of it, the borders which have kept us safer than virtually anyone else in the world, in a world of over 2.15 million lives lost this year, we’ve had, mercifully at this stage, no Australians lose their lives to COVID from Australia.
DAVID LIPSON:
On those borders, Minister – sorry to interrupt.
GREG HUNT:
Testing, tracing, distancing, and vaccination, all of those five rings are fundamental to protecting Australia and we’re able to lift them progressively as the last ring becomes stronger.
DAVID LIPSON:
Is the halving of international arrivals an admission of failure of our, quote, hotel quarantine system?
GREG HUNT:
No. What it’s a recognition of is exactly what the Prime Minister said today, and I’ll quote, due to increased risks of the Delta strain of the virus. And so, it’s a recognition that the world is having to deal with this.
There’s the United Kingdom with I think 84 per cent approximately of first doses across the eligible population, and they’ve had 26,000 cases in the previous 24-hour period. That’s almost 1,000 times greater than the cases in Australia.
Not quite but, you know, getting towards that level. So what that shows is this is a more contagious strain, so we have to manage that. Right the way through the pandemic, what’s been the hallmark of what we’ve done and what’s kept Australia safe, it’s looking at the science, listening to the medical advice, and moving fast and moving early, and that’s what allowed us to have rates that the rest of the world looks at and says: wow, we wish we were in Australia’s position, although there are people doing it very hard at the moment.
DAVID LIPSON:
Absolutely they do when it comes to deaths and hospitalisations, but when it comes to the vaccine rollout, that has been problematic, to say the least. There is bad luck there sure, but this month, for example, the US has a surplus of 80 million doses. Taiwan, Canada, South Korea have all managed to secure some of those doses, why not Australia?
GREG HUNT:
Well, actually, Australia’s Pfizer vaccines are increasing. They’re going from 300,000 to over 600,000.
DAVID LIPSON:
That’s from Pfizer. I’m talking about from the Biden administration’s surplus.
GREG HUNT:
Well, in talking with Pfizer, what they’ve said is that they had planned and built in to Australia’s allocations that increase. So that was the advice I had from Anne Harris, the Australian head of Pfizer.
DAVID LIPSON:
But have we picked up the phone to President Biden and asked? I mean, is there a problem there? Is there a reason that we don’t get a piece of those that surplus number as well?
GREG HUNT:
If I may, we’ve just increased what we were expecting for July by 400,000. We were due to get 2.4 million. We’re now able to have 2.8 million, and we’ll have our next allocations for August very shortly.
And we’ve been working very hard on multiple fronts. And so, I never pre-empt. It’s always better to be cautious. And let’s just see how we go with our allocations. But at the very least, we’ll have these heightened levels that we already have at well over 600,000.
DAVID LIPSON:
So we may have more than what’s been announced?
GREG HUNT:
Look, we’re being very cautious. We’re always working on bringing things forward. As I say, we’ve been successful in securing that additional 400,000, which takes us from 2.4 to 2.8 million, which is, you know, will have lifted what would otherwise have been the case in July by 100,000 doses.
Think of this, today, the record numbers that were announced were off a weekly arrival of 300,000. That will go to well over 600,000 during the course of July. And there’s another 32.6 million to come, plus 10 million Moderna in the last five months of the year and if we’re able to reallocate and bring that forward, we will.
But to everybody, it’s been a really important day. We’re seeing lockdowns lifted in the NT and WA, record vaccinations, and a very clear pathway for Australians, so thank you for coming forward.
DAVID LIPSON:
Minister, thanks for your time.
GREG HUNT:
Thanks, David.
-ENDS-