HCP, CHSP workers next up for vaccination

Workers who deliver aged care services via the home care package and CHSP programs will be able to get vaccinated against COVID-19 during the second phase of the national vaccine rollout.

Prioritised front line health workers, including a targeted 318,000 aged and disability care staff and 190,000 residents, started getting their jabs of the Pfizer vaccine under phase 1a of the rollout this week.

Phase 1b of the rollout includes staff who deliver services through CHSP and HCP, the health department says. It also includes people aged over 70, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders over 55 and people with an underlying medical condition, including those with a disability.

Recipients of home and community care will be able to get vaccinated at vaccination clinics or GP practices once they become eligible.

The health department information doesn’t provide any timeframe of when phase 1b will occur and Community Care Review has sought further information.

The rollout is based on advice from the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation.

Health minister Greg Hunt on Wednesday confirmed that a doctor had been stood down after two residents of a Brisbane aged care home were given higher than stipulated doses of the vaccine but .

However he said they were not showing any adverse effects and the rollout has been proceeding well.

“At this point in the rollout all of the medical advice that we have, including the two individuals …. all of the individuals who have been vaccinated so far have shown no adverse reactions which is a wonderful result.”

More information about the national program is available here.

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