COVID-19 Vaccination Rollout

The Hon. F. PANGALLO (15:17): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. On current vaccination figures, can the minister give an indication of when South Australia will be able to declare an 80 per cent vaccination rate, and will it be in line with federal government estimates for the nation?

The Hon. S.G. WADE (Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (15:18): I don't have a formal estimated timing for 80 per cent. I have certainly seen estimates, both internal and external. They vary greatly because of the basis of the assumption. For example, I saw one in the media that was using the average number of doses delivered in the previous seven days and projecting that out two months ahead what that would mean for the completion date.

As I have already indicated in a previous answer, in South Australia's case that would be completely fallacious for last week. We ramped up and had a record hundred thousand doses last week. Doing an estimate that week you would be relying on the previous week and the projection would be poorly founded.

Also, I was surprised to see them in recent weeks because everyone knew that the additional supplies would come through strongly in September and onwards, and so the planning has been very much to increase our clinic capacity as the supply increases. Certainly, there will be both internal and external estimates of this date but in many ways I think many of the projections are not reliable.