I'd be happy if pfizer was readily available. Young people have sacrificed enough in this pandemic to be risking blood clots because the PM ****** up.

Oh FFS - most of the UK had the AZ shot - can we stop making mountains out of mole-hills? We really have become scared of risk haven’t we? How did we get so scared of everything?

What he said :D

Human Resources Departments (HR), Political Correctness. since i retired from the airlines and started running my own Company, I don't have any of those problems. It's quite liberating actually.

Spot on,nobody bothers reading the leaflet inside every prescription box you get from the chemist which highlights the risks of taking that medication.
If you are really concerned,talk to your gp & ignore the peanuts in our society who are experts on everything with not a qualification to back up any of the garbage they like to spread.

I had my first AZ a month ago. I’m still upright. Can’t wait until I get the second. I spent a lot of time in Africa during my flying career. I could have ended up with Malaria… I never did. I am happy to take the risk with AZ….

Hey, me too, Ghana, did we meet.

Dan Andrews can say whatever he likes because he doesn't have to live up to it as long as he keeps extending the State of Emergency.

It's interesting to see how easily Australians will give away and reason away their freedoms and encourage repression for others. As a society we used to be resilient and wary of what we're told to do; now we're more and more like a bunch of lemmings, all because of something that kills a few more than the flu has every year. It'll be fascinating to see in a year or two or five if this experimental substance they injected into the population was actually toxic; but then when has it all ever gone wrong before for our health?

You, me and 3,050,201 of the 3,050,209 (99.9998%) other Australians who have had at least one shot of the AstraZeneca vaccine.

Wow! Such an impressive percentage!

It must have been so difficult for Scotty to use the word "sorry" in a sentence. But you guys did a great job of doing it in a context in which that could be spun as an apology for his abject failures.

Keep up the 'good' work.

I give up!!!!

Yep, we're just being trolled here.

it doesn't make sense for a young person to take it, knowing that pfizer is only around the corner AND receiving the second jab at around the same time as an AZ jab if you were to have one today.

I'll take the bait. Utter rubbish.
Johns Hopkins report May 2021 "Doctors and scientists are working to estimate the mortality rate of COVID-19, but at present, it is thought to be substantially higher (possibly 10 times or more) than that of most strains of the flu."

It seems that in Australia we headline (and apparently in some quarters, panic over) the tiny mortality rate of AZ (1 in a million) but have no idea (or fear) of the true unmitigated (no-lockdown, no social distancing,'life as it was') rate of covid infection & mortality being suffered by our less fortunate overseas neighbours, because we've the benefit of geography and have taken sensible if painful precautions pending vaccination. That's always been a temporary state of affairs and it's encouraging that there seems to be a consensus on this thread among vaxxers and non-vaxxers alike that we should lift the restrictions once the choice has been made available to all. I just hope that our leaders set this as a supply achievement deadline (as Dan Andrews seems to suggest) and not as an ever-delayed vaccinated take-up level (as Gladys seems to prefer).
Ironically, when independence day comes, the non-vaxxers will be to a large degree protected (and no doubt thereby seek justification) by being surrounded by a majority sensible enough to have taken the jab, but there could also be a useful demonstration of the pros & cons if the health authorities have the sense to split the ongoing hospitalisation & mortality figures between the two groups.

Johns Hopkins report May 2021 "Doctors and scientists are working to estimate the mortality rate of COVID-19, but at present, it is thought to be substantially higher (possibly 10 times or more) than that of most strains of the flu."

looks like game over. You’d better stay home
for the rest of your life.

No. Not so.
We'll try this one more time.

Vaccination substantially reduces the risks of a) infection b) serious illness and c) death.
Widespread vaccination is expected to substantially reduces the incidence of transmission.
When those pre-requisites have been achieved, then and only then, can you expect that the populace will be likely to accept relatively low levels of infection, illness and death.

There is not a country that has yet managed to achieve the above combination.
Australia is not within the proverbial coo-ee of doing so.

WingNut60: Agree with most of that in an ideal world, but the hard choice for the politicians in a free society will be what to do when the take-up rate sticks at 60-70%.

From Axios News this week:
The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sounded the alarm over what she called a "pandemic of the unvaccinated" as COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths are again on the rise across the U.S. "There is a clear message that is coming through," Walensky said. "This is becoming a pandemic of the unvaccinated. We are seeing outbreaks of cases in parts of the country that have low vaccination coverage because unvaccinated people are at risk."

I guess there comes a point (hopefully soon) where if we have a demonstrably effective and available vaccine, then we have been given the opportunity to make our choice and must live with the consequences. We accept that with smokers, after all, despite c20k deaths a year here in Australia. I take great comfort from that stunning graph in post #6238 and hope the UK's leap of faith pays off....

She is on her own for the next 6 months.

McGowan and others have specially said they are not playing that game. The dialogue from all the Labor premiers is much the same. Essentially cut Sydney off from the rest of the nation until Christmas.

If anyone thinks there is any appetite in WA to open up.. they are on drugs. There is no way McGowan would let that happen. Most of us in WA are happy to do short lock downs when required .. comply with mask wearing and generally follow the rules. The rest of the time.. as long as we stay in the State, we can live almost normally ( for the moment).

My sentiments exactly. 👍👍