A top public servant has dismissed concerns over issues in the government’s COVID-19 rollout, including two elderly Australians overdosing, as “noise”.
Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (PMC) secretary Phil Gaetjens fronted the Senate’s COVID-19 committee and was pressed on issues arising in the fortnight since Australia’s vaccine rollout began.
Two elderly Queenslanders were hospitalised in February after receiving four times the recommended dose of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine, administered by a doctor who had not completed mandatory training.
The pair were released from hospital after suffering no ill effects.
Around 150 Pfizer doses were also discarded out of “an abundance of caution” after uncertainty over their storage.
But under pressure from Labor senator Katy Gallagher, Mr Gaetjens played down the incidents as “teething issues”.
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“I would raise those issues in the…
