AGED care facilities in the region are on track to reach the required minimum first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine by mid-September.
Reports this week that 66 nursing homes across the state had yet to reach the halfway mark have not mirrored those throughout north-west Victoria with several facilities in the Mallee already at between 90 and 100 per cent compliance.
COVID-19 vaccination will be mandatory for all residential aged care workers and residential aged care workers are required to have received a minimum first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine by September 17.
It will be a condition of working in a residential aged care facility through shared state, territory and Commonwealth authorities and compliance measures.
Facilities in the north-west with the highest compliance of first vaccine dose at between 90 and 100 per cent, as at August 17, include Princes Court Homes, Oasis Aged Care, Regis Sunraysia, Mallee Track Health & Community Service-Ouyen and Riverside Campus Residential Aged Care at Robinvale.
Between 80 and 89 per cent of staff at Manangatang Multi-Purpose Service have had at least one dose, as have between 70 and 79 per cent of staff at Jacaranda Village in Red Cliffs and Murray House in Wentworth.
Regis Ontario has between 60 and 69 per cent of staff with at least one dose, while between 50 and 59 per cent of staff at Bupa Mildura, Chaffey Aged Care in Merbein and Robinvale Multi-Purpose Service have had at least one jab.
Princes Court Homes chief executive officer Jenny Garonne said she expected the remainder of staff at the facility would have had at least one dose of vaccine within the next week.
“We have worked with service providers and the community to make sure that we had vaccinations available on site so we were able to then make sure that all the staff had been vaccinated in the easiest possible way,” Ms Garonne said.
“We have just encouraged people to be vaccinated and the majority of staff were very amenable in regard to it,” she said.
“The take-up rate has definitely been positive and that gives residents and their families peace of mind.
“Like every organisation, it is about promoting the benefits of vaccination.
“If we can ensure that most of the community is vaccinated then we’re all going to benefit from it and keep everybody secure and safe.”
Ms Garonne said the facility’s 130 staff and 100 residents were “well and truly under way to be vaccinated on both accounts” by the September 17 deadline.
She said residents had been coping “really well” despite the latest lockdown.
“Obviously, they are missing their families, but we’ve been putting on a whole range of different activities to keep them pretty busy,” she said.
COVID-19 vaccination has been recommended to be mandatory for full time, part-time and casual residential aged care workers, volunteers engaged by the facility and students on placement.
This includes anyone employed or engaged by a residential aged care facility who works on-site in a facility, such as direct care workforce, administration staff, ancillary staff, lifestyle/social care, transport drivers collecting residents from residential aged care facilities for outings, volunteers, students on placement, and medical practitioners who attend and provide care to residents.
Other workers not employed directly by a facility, and who only provide in-reach services, are not required to get a COVID-19 vaccination.
