The Prime Minister’s advice to bring children along to be vaccinated, who haven’t been booked, at the same time as parents has caused frustration at Christchurch clinics and pharmacies.
On Thursday, Jacinda Ardern said parents and caregivers would be able to book in 12-15-year-olds to receive their vaccination at the same time as their parent or caregiver.
She said “if you’ve already booked, just bring them along please, just make sure while you do that, you work hard to keep up your physical distancing from others”.
A group that represents GPs in Christchurch wrote to the Ministry of Health saying “we have expressed our concerns with the impact of the unexpected announcement encouraging bringing unbooked young people to their parent’s appointment, and this has been escalated to the Ministry of Health. We expect there will be further national public communications about this issue.”
A Christchurch mother emailed her local pharmacy to say her child would be accompanying her father along to also be vaccinated.
But the pharmacy responded by saying “Jacinda is great, but I’m afraid she is 100% wrong with this advice.”
“All appointments have already been allocated and there needs to be enough time in the day for drawing up fresh vaccine and a break for our vaccinating staff. Therefore squeezing people in with their parents is not possible. This incorrect advice has caused a lot of hassle and has been raised by clinics with the Ministry of Health for the confusion and annoyance that it is causing.”
Screenshot: Supplied
Another pharmacist in Christchurch said they had dozens of parents and children turning up and has described the situation as “a circus.”
COVID-19 Response Minisiter Chris Hipkins addressed this concern at this afternoon’s 1pm conference saying “if you’re bringing your younger family members with you to be vaccinated, make sure you’ve made an appointment for them as well.”
He said “If people are being turned away, bringing the children with them to be vaccinated, it’ll be because the place they’re going doesn’t have the capacity to be able to vaccinate that many people. “
Mr Hipkins said “so ring ahead and make sure that they have the capacity to be able to do that.”
“We have got systems in place so that those people would be able to rebook within two weeks to get the vaccines at the same time as their children.”
