Acting Premier James Merlino fronted the media early on Friday morning before the national cabinet meeting, where he requested the federal government help cover “gaps” in the vaccine rollout to Victoria. “We have seen a significant increase in demand for both Pfizer and AstraZeneca at our state centres, we‘re now running at around 140,000 doses per week but demand still exceeds access,” he told reporters.“People are having to wait weeks, we have seen long queues, we have also seen gaps in access, particularly in regional Victoria and in our peri-urban areas. “This morning we have made a request to the Commonwealth, a request to double the distribution, double the number of AstraZeneca to our primary care givers, our GP network.”Mr Merlino said GP clinics could “double” the amount of jabs they were administering. “We want to see a doubling of the AstraZeneca vaccine to our GPs,” he said.“We also want to see additional Pfizer allocations, starting from a further 100,000, an additional 100,000 from mid-June and some confidence in supply for that six-week period. “We need some ongoing confidence that supply is coming.”Mr Merlino said the discussion so far with the federal government about the request had been “positive”.“The federal government has indicated they will do all they can to ensure that additional request from Victoria is met,” he said.Health authorities were yet to release how many new locally acquired cases of Covid-19 were recorded in the past 24 hours. It comes after two cases previously linked to Melbourne‘s growing outbreak on Thursday were reclassified as false positives.A woman previously understood to have acquired the virus at a display home in Mickleham and a man who was thought to have contracted COVID-19 at the Brighton Beach Hotel were removed from the state‘s official case count.
Powered by WPeMatico
