{"id":12777,"date":"2021-09-01T08:32:37","date_gmt":"2021-09-01T08:32:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/?p=12777"},"modified":"2021-09-01T08:32:37","modified_gmt":"2021-09-01T08:32:37","slug":"first-nations-vaccine-rollout-reveals-usual-lack-of-care-and-incompetence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/2021\/09\/01\/first-nations-vaccine-rollout-reveals-usual-lack-of-care-and-incompetence\/","title":{"rendered":"First Nations vaccine rollout reveals usual lack of care and incompetence"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Greens say that the Government&#8217;s approach to vaccinating First Nations people,<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>disabled people and aged care residents, has been unacceptable and once again led to a tragic death that could have been prevented if adequate planning and support for experts was given when it was asked for.<br \/>\nCommunities should not have to be begging for support, Greens spokesperson on Health Senator Rachel Siewert said.<br \/>\nWe are more than a year into this pandemic, the Government cannot say they weren\u2019t warned about how devastating a COVID outbreak would be in First Nations communities.<br \/>\nWhy didn\u2019t Ministers do more to prevent COVID outbreaks in First Nations communities?<br \/>\nPriority groups were meant to be vaccinated first, but the Government\u2019s approach to vaccinating those groups has been haphazard at best, bordering on just plain negligence.<br \/>\nWe cannot be talking about \u2018opening up\u2019 or easing restrictions when this Government cannot even ensure the safety of First Nations people, despite very clear warnings.<br \/>\n<strong>DjabWurrung, Gunnai and Gunditjmara Senator for the Greens Lidia Thorpe said:\u00a0<\/strong><br \/>\nThe Morrison government is putting First Nations peoples lives at risk by failing to listen to us. Overcrowded housing, food insecurity and an under-resourced healthcare sector in regional areas hurt us before the pandemic.<br \/>\nThis pandemic\u00a0has put a spotlight on government neglect, that has existed for decades.<br \/>\nThe Maari Ma Aboriginal Health Corporation gave the Morrison government warnings and strategies for managing COVID-19 in western New South Wales 18 months ago. This was ignored, and now Wilcannia has the highest transmission rate in NSW.<br \/>\nJust last month, the National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation was excluded from a national COVID-19 vaccine task force meeting, despite Aboriginal health services being primarily responsible for delivering vaccines to First Nations people.<br \/>\nHow much proof do you need that this top-down approach isn\u2019t working?<br \/>\nNon-Indigenous peoples vaccination rates are double ours in most states and territories. This shows First Nations people that we are not a priority for this government.<br \/>\nThe Australian government hasn&#8217;t looked after First Nations people since colonisation, so this government needs to hand over control of our affairs back to the people.<br \/>\nPeople on the ground know what&#8217;s best for their communities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Greens say that the Government&#8217;s approach to vaccinating First Nations people,\u00a0disabled people and aged care residents, has been unacceptable and once again led to a tragic death that could have been prevented if adequate planning and support for experts was given when it was asked for. Communities should not have to be begging for &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/2021\/09\/01\/first-nations-vaccine-rollout-reveals-usual-lack-of-care-and-incompetence\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;First Nations vaccine rollout reveals usual lack of care and incompetence&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aussie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12777\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}