Katie’s tragic death was preventable by the current government
Below is an excerpt of longer form research, which can be found here.
People were asked to make an ‘informed decision’ for the sake of the community, in the likelihood of experiencing a ‘one in a million’ event.
Between 28th June – 24th July 2021, GP’s in Australia were acting on the Prime Minister’s interpretation[1] of ATAGI advice as it related to AstraZeneca. Scott Morrison had already ignored Chief Health Officers’ advice to abandon the AstraZeneca vaccine, as Rick Morton reports for The Saturday Paper here.
On the 29th June 2021, the Australian government published the document containing incongruent, uncertain data tables; ‘Weighing up the potential benefits against risk of harm from COVID-19 AstraZeneca’[2], the same day healthcare providers could offer AZ to those under 60. There is no mention of risk to women this document; it doesn’t even mention the word ‘women’. There was also assumably little-to-no turn around for GP’s working on the frontline to consider this information before seeing patients. Anecdotally, there are personal accounts of vast inconsistencies in the advice from GP’s with a spectrum ranging from convincing younger people to take AZ (in the case of a female in her 30’s) to trying to talk them out of it (in the case of a male in his 30’s) as two examples.
Making it easier for GP’s to administer AstraZeneca without risk begs the question – under what conditions are doctors given legal protection like the federal government no fault indemnity scheme? As an example, it could be asked – how many people have died from the flu vaccine? What makes the COVID-19 AstraZeneca vaccine different from any other vaccine? How many times previously has the government offered amnesty for GP’s? If it’s the only time – who was responsible for the decision to indemnify GP’s? Because they are now also partly responsible for eleven deaths in Australia caused by the administration of AstraZeneca.
What makes the AstraZeneca vaccine different by introducing indemnity for GP’s, is that the federal government didn’t take ATAGI’s advice, and that observing a living evidence situation evolving internationally, there was a known and mounting risk of fatality. By 28th June 2021, AstraZeneca was known by the government to be a life-saving vaccine that was simultaneously creating its own death tolls across the world. By rolling it out to as many people, there was little doubt that people would die. There is something suggested in the use of indemnity for GP’s – introducing the scheme on 28th June couldn’t do anything other than motivate the uptake of AstraZeneca. Decision-makers were in possession of information that wasn’t made public, so that the consumer couldn’t make an informed choice. How can it be an informed choice, when vital information is omitted regarding recommended age groups and the mountain of evidence suggesting women, and particularly younger women, were more at risk.
What is informed consent if the information to be informed with, is not communicated by the government or medical authorities and therefore is not accessible for the patient to give consent on the basis of being informed? These are important questions to flag both in reflecting on decisions made, but also to for any future precedents that may be set regarding protection from known risks, communication of risks and the emphasis placed on informed consent without access to knowledge.
– Katie Lees’ Family
[1] https://www.pm.gov.au/media/virtual-press-conference-1
[2] https://www.health.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/2021/06/covid-19-vaccination-weighing-up-the-potential-benefits-against-risk-of-harm-from-covid-19-vaccine-astrazeneca_2.pdf
Katie Lees 