GPs fear AstraZeneca vaccines could go to waste - Sydney Morning Herald

Doctors say leftover supplies of the AstraZeneca vaccine could expire in the over-stocked fridges of medical clinics due to falling demand, wasting scarce global resources.

General practitioners say patients are cancelling bookings at their AstraZeneca clinics, while some doctors have reported receiving several hundred extra doses of the vaccine beyond what they had ordered in anticipation of a now disrupted ramping up of the rollout.

Dr Umair Masood, a Gisborne GP, is worried he has too many doses of AstraZeneca, and not enough willing patients.Credit:Paul Rovere

While many patients who had already received their first dose of the vaccine are returning for their second, demand for first doses has fallen, exacerbated by recent news the AstraZeneca vaccine will be phased out by October, except on request.

One Melbourne GP said doctors were struggling to fill evening clinics for first doses of AstraZeneca, so she was using some excess doses to immunise elderly people in retirement villages who were not mobile enough to visit medical clinics.

Hawthorn doctor Sarah Hume said the government must start planning now for what it will do with any extra doses of the vaccine.

“To waste huge amounts of a vaccine when there are so many people who need it around the world would be devastating,” Dr Hume said.

“Logistically, the doses that are already sitting in a GP’s fridge are not going to make it overseas to countries in desperate need because there’s not going to be time to get them where they need to be and then time for them to be given.”

Royal Australian College of General Practitioners president Dr Karen Price said GPs had been given extra doses by the Federal Government in anticipation of a jump in demand due to scheduled second doses. But instead they’ve faced a drop in appetite for the vaccine, following the ATAGI decision to raise the age for those allocated the AstraZeneca vaccine from 50 and over, to 60 and over.

Melbourne GP and president of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, Dr Karen Price. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen

Dr Price said it was still unclear what would happen if GPs ended up with excess doses.

However a federal health spokesman urged medical practices with excess stock to contact the Vaccine Operations Centre to have their doses collected and allocated to areas in need.

He added that the government had made a commitment to support the countries without enough vaccine doses and “any of the doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine not used in Australia will be donated overseas.”

Some poorer countries have run out of COVID vaccines or are on the brink of doing so, only months after receiving their first humanitarian aid shipments from Covax, a global program aimed at equitably distributing life-saving shots to poorer nations. Despite concerns raised over an extremely rare clotting disorder, the AstraZeneca vaccine has been successfully administered to millions of people worldwide and is extremely effective at preventing COVID deaths and illness.

Earlier this month, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Australia would donate 20 million doses of locally made AstraZeneca vaccines to Asian and Pacific nations as part of a global plan to deliver one billion doses to nations seeking urgent help confronting the pandemic.

Some general practices are expected to begin administering Pfizer jabs from July 5. Vaccine distribution by GPs fell just slightly this week compared to the week before, according to national data.

Victorian GP Umair Masood, who runs the Neal Street Medical Clinic in Gisborne in the Macedon Ranges, said he put in an order for 200 doses of AstraZeneca vaccine last week, the bulk of which was for second shots for patients. Instead, he said the clinic was sent a batch of 800 AstraZeneca doses.

Dr Umair Masood with the oversupply of the AstraZeneca vaccine he was given by the government.Credit:Paul Rovere

“Without doubt we are worried we won’t get through the supply in the next few weeks and then what happens? Do we just throw them all out?” Dr Masood said.

“AstraZeneca has become an impossible sell. Even elderly patients who haven’t had their first shot yet are saying: ‘I’ll just wait for Pfizer’.”

He said a vaccine clinic run by the medical practice on Friday afternoon had 45 patients booked in, but only 11 people showed up.

A weekend clinic with almost 200 patients booked in, has already had more than half cancel and Dr Masood said he was worried others would not show up.

Much of Dr Masood’s vaccine supply will expire in October, but the vice president of the newly-formed Australian Society of General Practice said the clinic was actively considering scaling back its AstraZeneca vaccine clinics in the coming weeks.

Australian Medical Association national president Omar Khorshid said it was inevitable doses of AstraZeneca, which can last for several months in a refrigerator, would be wasted if patients did not turn up for their appointments.

However, he said it was critical there was a plan moving forward for the tens of millions of AstraZeneca doses the pharmaceutical giant had to commit in contracted arrangements with the Australian Government.

Roughly 4 million AstraZeneca doses have been administered in Australia, with contracts drawn up for more than 53 million.

“It is extremely important in Australia that we make sure that we don’t waste too many AstraZeneca doses and that those doses get sent to people who want them,” Dr Khorshid said.

Victorian GP Bernard Shiu said his weekly AstraZeneca clinic in Geelong had 100 vaccination appointments, but on Friday just eight people got their first dose of the vaccine. The bulk of the patients, 78 people, were there for their second dose.

Dr Shiu said the Federal Government was supplying medical practices with more vaccines than they had ordered on the expectation demand would be higher for first doses.

“When we ordered 100, they gave us 200,” he said. “Our fridge is running out of space, and we need to prepare for space for Pfizer vaccines. It would be a good idea to look at other less-fortunate countries, to supply them with what we are not able to use.”

The Victorian deputy chair of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners said that there was now a real risk AstraZeneca vaccines would expire in the fridges of medical clinics.

Dr Shiu said GPs hadn’t yet been instructed what to do with any expired vaccines. Although they have been given permission to share them with other local practices, those practices may be facing the same oversupply issue, he said.

Sydney GP Charlotte Hespe said the current outbreak in the harbour city underlined while it was important to have many people vaccinated as quickly as possible.

But she said people had received so many mixed messages about the vaccine they were confused, and some who had already had one AstraZeneca vaccine were considering putting off their second dose, despite strong advice that it was safe.

Footscray GP Simon Benson said his clinic had several hundred doses in the fridge, but doctors were observing diminishing demand as patients who had their first dose of AstraZeneca were requesting booster shots of Pfizer instead.

“Obviously it’s a real concern,” Dr Benson said. “We don’t want it to go to waste. I think it’s a terrible shame that we can’t use it in Victoria. I counsel five to seven patients a day who are eligible for AstraZeneca. After a complicated conversation about risk, most of them will still go ahead with it, but it’s getting harder and harder.”

He said the system for ordering coronavirus vaccines was flawed, because it only allowed doctors to order their ‘maximum’ number of doses which had been outlined in the expression of interest process before challenges with AstraZeneca arose.

Doctors are now asking to be able to request less vaccine doses in a system mirroring the annual distribution of influenza shots, where you make a request based on demand.

Dr Price said it had long been the plan that supplies of AstraZeneca would tail off as alternatives arrived later this year, but this week’s news that the vaccine would be available only by request from October had played into people’s incorrect perceptions that AstraZeneca was a “bad vaccine” compared to the alternatives.

“It’s become what we feared,” she said. “The older age groups … are not getting the message about how dangerous COVID is.”

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2021-06-25 19:00:00Z
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