From Wednesday June 2 until Sunday June 6, workers in private sector aged care facilities and the residential disability sector will be given priority access to walk-in vaccination hubs around Victoria between 9am and 4pm when they present evidence of their employment.
The following vaccination hubs are participating in the 5-day blitz including:
“This is about stimulating that demand and getting more workers to get greater coverage at the private aged care sector and the disability sector,” said the Minister, Luke Donnellan.
“We have concerns there isn’t enough coverage, that is why we are stepping in.”
Government can’t say how many aged care workers have been vaccinated
The vaccination blitz comes as it emerges the government doesn’t know how many aged care workers have been vaccinated.
When asked on ABC Radio this morning how many aged care workers had received their vaccine, the Minister for Aged Care Services Richard Colbeck said there were 40,000 vaccinated aged care staff that the government “is aware of”.
He explained the health advice was for residents and staff not to be vaccinated at the same time, and worker vaccination was complicated by the fact that anyone under 50 was not recommended to receive the AstraZeneca vaccine.
He said the government’s centralised vaccination database, which stores information about all our vaccines, does not have the granularity of including occupation.
Colbeck said the government is now asking providers to inform them about staff vaccinations when they submit information about flu vaccinations.
Arcare mystery case no longer a mystery
Victoria’s Minister for Health Martin Foley said the first reported case in aged care, at Arcare Maidstone, has now been linked back to an infection source.
“The genomic sequencing has confirmed that that case is directly linked to the South Australian hotel outbreak quarantine,” he said.
“That is at least confirming in our mind that this is all the one related cluster from the South Australian hotel breach.”
The Minister also revealed that all staff and residents at Blue Cross Sunshine aged care home have tested negative, apart from the one reported case yesterday, an aged care worker working between Arcare Maidstone and Blue Cross sunshine.
Correct. Substantiating the fact that it was the inability of the Victorian government to handle the original infection from SA. By attributing blame to the slow take up of vaccination by care staff is allowing the true cause to escape scrutiny and resolution. The continued failure of Victorian contact tracing is once again the root cause of another thankfully small unnecessary spread. Note that electronic sign on was only activated one day AFTER this incident occurred. Not good enough.
This is ridiculous. How can aged care workers make it to those places and not cross into exposure zones. How about come to facilities. We were all ready , consented and willing when the residents were done. But now it is so far and so inconvenient fir staff to get done. Make it easier for us and closer to where we work.
Aged care workers and residents have been badly let down by the Morrison government. Scotty from Marketing strikes again. All talk no walk. Only 57% of residents vaccinated in Victoria. No-one clearly knows how many workers have been vaccinated because they weren’t ‘part of the contract’ and were simply left to fend for themselves. Now we have a two week lockdown with no Jobkeeper because we can all ‘go to Centrelink’. Good job.
Case in point. Even today, the failures of contact tracing in Victoria is written large.
https://www.heraldsun.com.au/leader/east/woolworths-ashwood-encourages-customers-to-use-qr-code/news-story/d7eb12f7120d97170058e680c3c17ca4
It’s not rocket science..all aged care staff should have mandatory covid vaccination. It’s their job to protect the vulnerable. It doesn’t matter if it’s state or federal, it should be easy to access and it should be now. If you object to the vaccination then do another job.