The lack of vaccination can be squarely blamed at the federal gov't of australia, where they squandered their vaccination roll out by putting all their eggs in one Astrazenica basket, and not ordering enough pfizer doses. Then, after the blood clotting risks of AZ was verified, obviously many younger people in australia is going to be hesitant in taking AZ, when the covid cases are low.

And the AZ deals the gov't has made was not transparent, which reeks of corruption, and it bit them in the ass now. Even now, the gov't (note, the gov't, not the medical community) is recommending that young people talk to their GP and take AZ (conveniently, this absolves the gov't of the responsibility of providing more pfizer, and force the young people between a rock and a hard place in terms of risk).

So if there are any australians here reading this, you will do well to never vote for the liberal party in your life time.

As an Aussie, is all pretty on-the-money. To elaborate further, the details of the AZ deal were blocked from a FOIA request by the government under national security grounds. Reeks of corruption is an understatement.

The Aussie population, by and large, really wants to be vaccinated. There's some who are a bit illogical about the perceived risks of AZ blood clots, but that's firmly on the media who played up that risk at a time when the risk of covid proper was minimised due to our success. This has created a subset of people who insist on waiting for Pfizer.

But that wouldn't be a problem if our government hadn't fucked up ordering vaccines so badly in the first place. Their work was truly atrocious.

I'm locked down, and it's not too bad, but why the hell aren't there rapid spit kits everywhere? I think the federal government is a shitshow and do not have anything positive to say about them, but given that they stuffed up, it's going to take some time fix that. I am fully vaccinated, and I would voluntarily keep going with lockdown so that others don't die. If we had persisted with rolling out AZ, between 20 ~100 people would have died from the vaccine nationally (in australia) At the time, given the low death rate from Covid, that was too high. Of course then the federal government stuffed up quarantine too. If NSW opens up, people are going to die, disproportionally they will be Indigenous people, and poorer people who didn't vote Scomo.

So to clarify, the government was, as the other poster says, corrupt about the vaccine...but you trust them to make the right decision about lockdowns?

Am I reading that correctly?

We'll I wasn't answering for myself, but trying to explain what I believe is the mainstream thinking providing the political support for recent laws. As for me, I don't trust the federal government - they're appalling. I do have more faith in the individuals recruited into my local government to manage the pandemic, but most importantly I have no fear of the government's ability to enact any totalitarian fantasies they may harbour.

>We'll I wasn't answering for myself, sorry I've mixed the comments, that answer was about my views. I'm supporting the lockdown, because it's the best substitute we currently have for widespread vaccination , which is in a diabolical state because the federal government isn't even really trying. Choosing lockdown over a huge death toll is not in anyway about supporting the federal government, who have generally been opposed to lockdowns. I do think rapid saliva tests would do a lot of good, I know some don't trust decentralising the control of testing, but I think it would allow us to ease the current restrictions with some degree of safety.

the vaccine procurement corruption is a high level decision made by only a few people doing the deals. The lockdown is medical advice which is not made by a few individuals but by knowledge gained in the past.

The federal gov't almost didn't want to have lockdown in the first wave, and fortunately it was the state gov't doing it (by medical advice) that pushed it over.

The fact that you somehow confuse it together into one lump, and attribute it to a singular government entity decision, either means you did not really do any research or look into it. Or you are maliciously spreading FUD to cause distrust in existing institutions.

The lockdown is a decision made by the government. The AZ vaccine situation was a decision made by the government.

You trust the government decision to implement lockdown but not the decision regarding the AZ vaccine?

Different governments (vaccine is federal, lockdowns are state). Even between the NSW (state) and federal governments, both with the same party in power (and where the current prime minister hails from) there's been significant disagreements (compared to regular levels) over policy.