The mistakes that led to a doctor allegedly injecting two aged care residents with four times the recommended dose of the Pfizer jab must be investigated, but should not undermine faith in the rollout, Dr Khorshid says.
The 94-year-old woman and 88-year-old man were taken to hospital on Tuesday after they received the excess dosage, and were reported to be physically okay at the time of writing.
Health Minister Greg Hunt told Parliament late on Wednesday that the doctor involved had not completed the mandatory online training.
Dr Khorshid said he was glad to see that the patients appeared to be doing well, and noted that evidence from the vaccine rollout overseas suggests there should be no risk to their health.
“In a big vaccine rollout like this, including the use of multi-dose vials, there will be isolated instances where mistakes are made,” he said.
“It’s important that every healthcare worker involved in the vaccination process has completed the appropriate training.”
Dr Moy told the ABC that he could not understand how the mistake had occurred, but said that lessons must be learned.
“To be frank, this has brought some realism to this,” he told ABC News Breakfast.
“This is a massive undertaking with a lot of moving parts, but the correct health safety mechanisms kicked in. There was immediate recognition, there was transparency, it was admitted.
“Now we need to go through the proper investigations and the next step is to make sure that it doesn’t happen again.”
Dr Moy said the vaccine was a precious resource and it was clear that all healthcare workers needed to go through the mandatory training to ensure it was delivered safely and without wastage.
“It’s put the warning sign up for everybody that you need to tick all the boxes,” he said.
“There are systems in there that have picked this up immediately.
“The frustration is that we have lost about six doses of this precious vaccine. We don’t have that much of it, and we need to get it out there as quickly as possible.”
