- 5 years ago
23 June 2021
On a mission to encourage people to consider global herd immunity and not just its own position, the Immunisation Coalition this week embarked on a campaign urging Australians to donate to “make a difference in the global fight against the COVID-19 pandemic”.
With less than three per cent of Australians fully protected despite the country having enough shots for all its citizens to be vaccinated twice over, it makes you question, are Australians vaccine greedy?
In Jimmy Rees’ ‘Meanwhile in Australia’ video series, the comedian parodies the vaccine snobbery of many Australians, but he isn’t the only one to do so. Satirical publication The Betoota Advocate also features stories with headlines such as, ‘Government set to give over 50s the choice between AstroZucchini or dying when borders open‘.
A recent Sydney Morning Herald survey found “almost one-third of adult Australians say they are unlikely to be vaccinated against COVID-19” despite the country’s own CSL pumping out more than a million AZ vaccines a week since March. With the Australian Government having purchase deals with Pfizer, Moderna and Novavax, it is clear the country has no shortage of vaccine options.
“High-income countries have reserved more than half of the world’s COVID-19 vaccine doses despite representing only 14 per cent of the world’s population,” Professor Robert Booy of the Immunisation Coalition says. “This compares to less than five per cent vaccine uptake in low-income countries, which represent approximately two-thirds of the world’s population.”
More than six million Australians have been administered at least one Covid vaccine provided free by the Government, with millions more vaccines either coming out of CSL or arriving on our shores and waiting to be put into arms. But as developing nations watch their death rate climb, should we not be asking, is this fair?
“We should support our neighbours in the Indo-Pacific, Southeast Asia and the Pacific – they’re at risk of COVID, the number of cases is going up rapidly in many countries like Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, the death rate is far, far higher than it is in Australia,” Professor Booy told MedNews.
“I think we should take a leadership position in being generous. We’ve seen the G7 promise a billion doses for the third world and that’s enough for 500 million people to be vaccinated. Australia has promised 20 million of that. We’ve promised a small amount. We could certainly promise more and we have the economy to support that kind of generosity.”
Inequality of access to vaccines in developing nations is limiting Australia’s vision of getting back to normal, yet with vaccines continuing to be a political football and a divisive topic, Australians are struggling to think of anyone but themselves.
Yet as most of us go about our relatively Covid-free lifestyles, citizens of many lower-income countries can only dream of being offered a single dose of any vaccine, prompting UNICEF to urge Australians to at least reach into their pockets and help out.
“Every $10 donated will provide one person with a COVID-19 vaccination in a low-income country. Giving $100 could protect 10 people,” UNICEF Australia’s Director of Fundraising and Communications Libby Hodges said.
While Covid may be on the decline in first-world nations, lives continue to be lost in countries that aren’t adequately equipped to manage the impact of the virus, let alone fund a proper vaccine rollout. In this light, vaccine complacency and hesitancy infecting so many Australians begins to look more than a little out of place.
*Kayla Olaya is a student at the University of Technology Sydney and a MedNews intern. This is her first published comment piece.