Richard Colbeck (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Senior Australians and Aged Care Services) Share this | Hansard source

Thanks, Senator Van, for the question. It's an important one, especially given the Prime Minister and the health minister have advised of the TGA's provisional regulatory approval of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which, of course, is central to our vaccine strategy.

Rolling out the COVID-19 vaccine to our frontline healthcare and quarantine workers and our most vulnerable is the highest priority of the government. We saw the first delivery of Pfizer vaccines touch down in Sydney yesterday, and we are working to have those vaccines distributed to those priority groups across the country. Vaccination for residents and staff will be made available through residential aged-care facilities where they live or work. The vaccine implementation plan for residential aged care aims to administer doses to more than 240 aged-care facilities in the first week. Vaccines will be delivered by Commonwealth led teams. Healthcare Australia will provide vaccination workforce in New South Wales and Queensland, and Aspen Medical will be responsible for the other states and territories. The vaccination program will be supported at local levels by the Primary Health Networks, and everybody responsible for providing the vaccine in aged-care settings will be required to have completed the relevant training, including the use of multidose phials, cold storage and, of course, infection control. In the coming weeks, the vaccination program will reach more than 2,600 residential aged-care facilities and more than 183,000 residents and 339,000 staff.