A senior public servant tasked with reviewing the government’s Covid-19 vaccine and treatment procurements has warned that the world isn’t Covid-stable yet, and Australia needs be ready to respond to a new wave or variant.

“We are not yet covid-stable … we can see it but we’re not quite there yet, and that’s got implications for the decisions that the government has to make over the next coming months.” Dr Jane Halton, the former secretary of the departments of Health and Finance, told a media conference in Canberra on Tuesday after handing down her report.

“All the advice available is that at the moment we cannot predict what this virus will do,” Dr Halton said. “What we do know is that we need to be prepared, scale up quickly and ensure we have sufficient vaccine for the next couple of years.”

The report makes eight recommendations including

• better public health campaigns around vaccine uptake

• updating the covid-19 policy framework

• streamlining and increase flexibility around advisory structures, including ATAGI

• reviewing distribution arrangements

• ensuring supply of vaccines and treatments across 2023 and 2024

Dr Halton, who also chaired the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and co-chaired the COVAX initiative, gave Australia a thumbs up for being able to procure effective covid-19 vaccines and treatments in a highly competitive global market.

New advisory structures required

However pre-pandemic structures and processes weren’t fit for purpose in an emergency context, she said.

“With the likelihood of continuing waves of COVID-19 and the need for ongoing, integrated advice, new advisory structures and mandates will be required,” she writes in her report.

“It is timely to consider the role and nature of existing structures and processes. The ad hoc arrangements put in place at the beginning of pandemic require updating.

“In the event a new and significantly different variant with severe health outcomes emerges, the capacity to respond rapidly and at scale should remain a policy and delivery priority.”

Readiness to scale up

Dr Halton said significant stocks of treatments were available in Australia and should provide adequate cover for the next 12 months.

However mechanisms to scale up supply in the event of emergency demand must remain, as well as the ability to quickly stand-up mass vaccination clinics.

Dr Halton said ‘covid-stable’ would look very much like influenza, with public health officials knowing when to expect waves of infection, and covid ‘seasons’, and being able to prepare for with voluntary vaccination programs.

Wider inquiry foreshadowed

Health minister Mark Butler said the review was commissioned to ensure Australia remained on the front foot in managing the pandemic.

“We commissioned this review to make sure future procurement and purchasing strategies are fit for purpose and appropriate,” he said.

“The government will now carefully consider the recommendations in the report as part of its long-term strategy to manage COVID-19.” 

He said the government also intended to launch an inquiry into the nation’s wider covid-19 response.

“There will come a time for a deep inquiry into the nation’s pandemic response,” the minister said. “It would be extraordinary not to have that inquiry given the extraordinary level of dislocation, death, distress and spending. That time will come.”