From reassurance to shambles: how Australia’s coronavirus vaccine rollout unravelled
Even before advice to limit AstraZeneca distribution over clotting, the government was under pressure to explain why the rollout was so far behind
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Australia’s vaccine rollout was dealt a blow on Thursday when the government announced that the Pfizer vaccine should be preferred for those under 50 due to concerns about extremely rare blood clotting events associated with the AstraZeneca product, which forms the backbone of Australia’s vaccine strategy.
That news led the opposition to again focus on the government’s failure to spread the risk by securing deals with other vaccine manufacturers such as Moderna and Johnson & Johnson. But even before the rumblings over the AstraZeneca clotting events translated into official advice to limit the vaccine’s distribution, the government was under pressure to explain why the vaccine rollout had fallen so far behind its initial rosy predictions.
Read the original article at The Guardian