Phase 1b of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout is under way, the largest phase of the program so far. An estimated 6.13 million people are set to be vaccinated during this phase.

It is the fundamental approval which allows Australia to proceed with our national vaccination strategy based on 50 million doses of Australian made vaccines, he said.
CSL will be ready to start delivering doses once each batch has been tested and approved. Mr Hunt expected that to happen in the next few days.
About 200,000 doses will be delivered to GPs this week, with that number rising to 400,000 doses across more than 4000 GPs over the coming month, a spokeswoman for federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said on Sunday.
On Monday morning, Deputy Chief Medical Officer Professor Michael Kidd called for patience as he acknowledged that people had been finding it difficult to book appointments with their GP to get the vaccination.
At the moment we have 1000 general practices which are starting this week to deliver the vaccines, but over the next three to four weeks another 3500 general practices right across the country will be coming online, he told 3AWs Neil Mitchell.
My message for those people who live in an area where you can find a practice nearby is just wait for three or four weeks until those 4500 practice sign-ups are up on the website, and we have arranged the rollout so that it is available locally to everybody right across the country.
Theres no panic for people to get vaccinated, we need to do this in an orderly manner, weve got 6 million people in phase 1b, obviously we cant vaccinate 6 million people in one day or one week, it does take us a few months to be able to cover everybody.
He said that all the practices which are due to be rolling out the vaccine this week in Victoria have received their doses, and there was no shortage of the vaccine or trained professionals to administer them.
Manufacturer CSL will soon be scaling up to roll out a million doses of the vaccine each week. Professor Kidd could not say how many doses had been manufactured by them to date.
I cant speculate on how many doses CSL has sitting waiting, he said.
Were going to have plenty of vaccine available to vaccinate everybody in group 1b over the next two to three months … I dont know exactly how many doses are there, but theyve been working on this for quite some time, so Im sure theres quite a lot.
He said that phase 1a will continue to be rolled out in parallel with phase 1b for the next four to six weeks as they continue to vaccinate essential workers. Many of them are now starting to get their second dose, he said.
A total of 250,000 doses were delivered across the country this week to all states and territories except for NSW, where roads were closed due to extreme rain and flooding.
Professor Kidd said he expected the roads in NSW to clear in the next 24 to 48 hours and many of the sites will be able to start vaccinating people in the next few days.
Dr Bernard Shiu and his employees are ready to administer the COVID-19 vaccine to patients at their Geelong clinic from Monday.Credit:Wayne Taylor
COVID-19 response commander Jeroen Weimar said he is expecting more than 20,000 people to be vaccinated this week, with around 300,000 people to be vaccinated by the end of April.
The rate of that continues to ramp up, I reckon well do 20,000-25,000 this week, the rate will go beyond that and well get to around 300,000 by the end of April, Mr Weimar told ABC Radio. Its a big ramp-up in the state program.
Transport Infrastructure Minister Jacinta Allan said Victoria had exceeded its target of 40,000 vaccines and delivered 52,000 doses in the first four weeks of the program.
She said the government was constantly reviewing whether more restrictions could be eased in Victoria.
All Victorians should be really pleased and proud of the effort theyve put in to keep the numbers at the zero level, that weve had for some time now, and well be considering the advice of the Chief Health Officer should any changes be made to restrictions in the coming week, she said.
Dr Bernard Shius medical practice in the Geelong suburb of Newcomb is one of the Victorian GP clinics which will start vaccinating Australians from Monday.
Every vial contains eight doses meaning if a patient does not show up for an appointment, Dr Shius team must scramble to bring someone else in before the vial goes bad.
The requirements for delivering these vaccines are very specific, said Dr Shiu, who is also the deputy chair of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, Victoria.
Its definitely not the flu vaccine … We have to make sure we get it right.
With Liam Mannix, Rachel Clun
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Simone is a crime reporter for The Age. Most recently she covered breaking news for The Age, and before that for The Australian in Melbourne.