A Sydney hospital has mixed up the vaccine records of a man who they said was fully vaccinated when he went to get his first jab, a report by The Guardian revealed.
Last week, Sydney bus driver Ke Hua rocked up to the vaccination clinic at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital for his first COVID-19 vaccine appointment. But, instead of being met with the needle, he was told that he had already had both doses of the vaccine.
“I went on the 24th of July and they said, ‘ oh in March you got one, and in June you got one,’” Hua told The Guardian.
“I said ‘I’ve never done it!’.”
Hua said he contacted NSW Health, Medicare, and local police thinking that someone had fraudulently used his details but was allegedly ignored. After the publication looked into it, health authorities said that someone most likely accidentally entered a stranger’s vaccinations into his file. Hua thinks differently.
“How can they put someone else in my record?” the man told the publication in response to health authorities.
“The record states my number and my name, and to put it in they have to get all my information to put it in the computer.”
The national database of vaccination records is based on the Australian Immunisation Register (Air). It’s managed by Services Australia, who said that there were systems and processes put in place to make sure that vaccination providers enter accurate info regarding each person’s vaccination.
“The provider is responsible for ensuring the information is correct,” a spokesperson told The Guardian.
“We work closely with the Department of Health to provide support for vaccination providers, making it as easy as possible to report quality information to the Air.
“To further increase the accuracy of records held on the Air, improvements have been made to the online Air systems to include ‘real time’ assessment of immunisation data submitted by vaccination providers.”
While it appears that this isn’t a widespread issue, if it is, it could dramatically halt the vaccine rollout and affect the accuracy of the Department of Health’s daily data about the total vaccinated population. According to The Guardian report, Services Australia did not comment on whether they had received more reports on this error.
The news comes after claims that executives at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital told staff to come into work despite being identified as close contacts.
All adult Aussies (yep, even if those of us under 40) are currently able to get the safe and effective AstraZeneca vaccine through a GP. Talk to a doctor to see if it’s right for you.
Alternatively, you can triple-check to see if you’re eligible for the Pfizer vaccine here.
The best vaccine is the first one you can get, and that’ll be our ticket out of this mess.
