COVID-19 vaccines set to come back to NSW regions

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said on Thursday she would source more vaccines from the Prime Minister to restore the regional NSW supplies.

Member for Murray Helen Dalton thanked the 4000 people who signed a petition urging the NSW Government to reverse its decision to send 40,000 regional vaccines to Sydney.

“I want to thank regional media and all those who made a noise about this,” Mrs Dalton said.

“We sent a message to the NSW Government that what they did was unfair to regional people,” she said.

“There’s no way the Premier would have sourced more vaccines for rural residents had there not been such an uproar.”

Mrs Dalton said the NSW Government ought to apologise to the thousands of regional NSW residents whose vaccine appointments had been cancelled.

“I was inundated with complaints — many people who contacted me took leave from work so they could go to their vaccine appointments,” she said.

“They were not given a date for a new appointment.

“The lack of transparency around these decisions is appalling.

“We really need people to trust government and follow health advice during a pandemic.

“But we can’t when there’s so much secrecy and deception.”

Earlier this week Mrs Dalton demanded the NSW Government release data on how many vaccines had been sourced from each regional NSW district, including the Far West, to be reallocated to Sydney HSC students.

“I’ve been inundated with complaints from people across Murray who have had their vaccine appointment postponed, so we need to get to the bottom of this,” she said.

“It’s hard to understand why the most remote, disadvantaged and Indigenous district in NSW (the Far West) is having to suspend their bookings so that vaccines can be sent Sydney.

“There are many Indigenous, elderly residents and essential workers in our region still not vaccinated.”