COVID-19 in Armidale: Pfizer is still not available at Rusden Street and some other medical centres

Dr Eric Baker has been practising at the clinic (which was established 75 years ago) for 40 years; he says his practice manager submitted an expression of interest in administering the Pfizer vaccine more than a month ago and has heard nothing since.

"We've asked, but no one can tell us why not," Dr Baker said.

"We've tried to get onto them to understand why but we have just hit a brick wall.

"We've done 2,000 patients with AstraZeneca, and we're telling our younger patients to book in for Pfizer with other clinics because Pfizer supplies are very limited in Armidale."

The other major clinic in Armidale, Faulkner Street Medical Centre, only received a delivery of Pfizer two weeks ago.

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Dr Baker said bad publicity around AstraZeneca early on had caused some people to defer their vaccination until an alternative comes along; however, he is encouraging all eligible patients to consider the AstraZeneca vaccine.

"It depends on the circumstances because if COVID-19 is with us, then people need to be vaccinated, especially people with certain medical conditions and people with respiratory problems," he said.

"It is a reasonable thing to wait only if you know you are not going to get COVID-19 in the meantime.

"Experts have said that achieving herd immunity is not going to be possible with the Delta variant, so it is going to be the vaccinated and the unvaccinated when COVID-19 is widespread.

"It is only a matter of time before everyone is exposed to COVID-19 and in spite of the less than one in a million mortality rate, AstraZeneca offers better than 90 percent protection against serious Covid disease."

Dr Maree Puxty has been a GP since 1993 and is the chair of the New England Division of General Practice, chair of the Hunter New England Central Coast Primary Health Network Rural Clinical Council, a senior lecturer in rural health for the University of New England School of Rural Medicine and one of the practice owners of West Armidale Medical Centre.

She said her clinic had also not received any Pfizer vaccine yet, despite administering AstraZeneca from the outset and registering for Pfizer back in May.

"I attend the federal government's Department of Health COVID-19 response update webinar for general practitioners each week, and my understanding is that all of the GP clinics that have expressed interest in administering Pfizer should have supplies by mid-September," Dr Puxty said.

"Nobody really knows why we haven't received Pfizer before now, but from attending these webinars, my understanding is that if in a town there is another vaccination hub (like Armidale Hospital), then the GPs in that town were less likely to receive Pfizer as there was already a place for people to obtain it."

Dr Puxty said she thought it was also dependent on the practice's capacity to have a suitable vaccination fridge and how successful it had been at distributing the AstraZeneca vaccine.

Both doctors are in agreement that people should strongly consider whatever vaccination against COVID-19 they can get.

"Everyone has to make up their own mind with the advice of their doctors, and most doctors are now advising adults to get vaccinated against COVID-19.," Dr Baker said.

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It is not only mortality from COVID-19 that was a concern, he said, but also the unknown lasting effect of severe COVID-19 infections.

"Long-Covid is like getting chronic fatigue syndrome, and we haven't had enough experience with Covid to know how long, long-Covid can last - or if you get it forever," Dr Baker said.

"A lot of people who have had severe Covid and have been hospitalised have ended up with permanent lung damage.

"The truth is people end up with more side effects from Pfizer than they do from AstraZeneca.

"The Pfizer vaccine can make people quite unwell with flu-like symptoms, but it is temporary."

At present, Pfizer is only available from the Armidale Hospital clinic or Ochre Medical Centre, Armajun Aboriginal Health Service, and Faulkner Street Medical Centre GP practices in Armidale, as well as the Uralla Medical Centre and Guyra Medical Centre.

In total, there are nearly 2,000 Pfizer doses in the Armidale/Uralla and Guyra community.

A spokesperson for the Minister for Health and Aged Care, Greg Hunt, told the Armidale Express the government is planning for the next Pfizer expansion of general practices, with more practices to be transitioned to Pfizer as soon as more vaccines become available.

"Due to supply constraints, it was not possible to allow all eligible general practices access to Pfizer in the first instance," they said.

"Practices in areas with limited access, such as regional, rural and remote areas and COVID-19 hotspots have been prioritised."

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