Dr Young and Health Minister Yvette D’Ath were at Bunnings Stafford in Brisbane’s north on Friday,with 33 Bunnings locations to offer vaccinations from Saturday as part of the broader push to get Queenslanders vaccinated.
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Queensland currently has 71.35 per cent of people with a first dose of vaccine,and 54.77 per cent are fully vaccinated on Friday.
Ms D’Ath said the NSW border announcement highlighted the need for Queenslanders to get vaccinated as soon as possible.
The minister and Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk have been on record in recent days putting the figure of 5-6 weeks as a potential reopening window,and Ms D’Ath clarified that was the time needed for people to be fully vaccinated.
“If you get your first dose today,it is going to be five to six weeks before you are fully covered by that vaccine,” she said.
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“If NSW are going to let in arrivals with no quarantine from the first of November,we’ve got no time to waste. This virus is coming to Queensland. Everyone needs to get vaccinated now.”
Queensland Health gave 16,072 vaccinations in the 24 hours to Friday morning,with more than 80 per cent of the over-70 age group now having received two doses.
However,younger age groups and more regional areas of the state were still seeing lower rates,leading the government to continue pushing everyone eligible for a vaccine to get one.
Ms D’Ath said that,until now,vaccine supply issues had kept the government from using Bunnings as distribution hubs in the same way NSW and Victoria have done,but that there were now ample supplies of vaccines.
One of Queensland’s new cases on Friday was a flight crew member who was routinely tested while transiting through Brisbane airport and tested positive after they had left.
Another was a truck driver who came up from Victoria through Goondiwindi in southern Queensland before driving to Ipswich.
Dr Young said the man got a notification from Victorian health authorities that he had tested positive,and immediately contacted Queensland authorities.
“He’s no risk to anyone at all,he’s totally asymptomatic,and I thank him very much for what he did to respond so quickly,” she said.
Queensland has now gone 11 straight days without any local cases recorded,with 28 active cases currently in the state.