Public confusion is slowing the number of Canberrans getting their vaccine boosters, experts say.
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Rules have changed so fast that people are being left unprotected.
Only half of the people eligible for a booster in the ACT have gone and got their third jab. Almost everyone - 98.6 per cent of Canberrans - got the first two so the low take-up can't be anti-vax sentiment.
Nor can it be the capacity of the system. Appointments to get boosters were available this week on the same day with online booking.
Some pharmacists said they were being run off their feet trying to keep up with calls for boosters but the two government centres - at the Australian Institute of Sport and the airport - were below capacity.
New research about to be published at the Australian National University is expected to reveal that a "lack of clear information" may be part of the reason for the slowness in getting the booster.
"Perhaps the greatest uncertainty at the moment is around eligibility, which changes quite frequently, and relies on people remembering first when they received their second dose, and secondly what the interval is," Professor Nick Biddle, head of the ANU's Centre for Social Research and Methods, said.
Another reason emerging from the research - which involved about 3,500 people being questioned nationally in January - is that "people who have been infected by COVID may not think a booster is needed."
There may also be people who make a calculation that the risk of getting COVID was high when they were completely unvaccinated but is now lower after two jabs - so they don't get the third.
But they are wrong, says Professor Adrian Esterman from the University of South Australia.
"A lot of people do not understand that two doses gives little protection from infection - or they do understand it, and are willing to risk a mild infection," the expert in the way diseases spread said.
"People need to be motivated to get a booster shot. That means better messaging from the government, and potentially a triple dose vaccine mandate."
At the moment, people get their vaccination certificate (allowing them to fly abroad, for example) after the first two doses. A vaccine mandate would increase that to three doses.
Even with the two government vaccination centres operating at below capacity, pharmacists said they were going flat out - but having to do all their usual tasks as well.
"We are booked out," pharmacist Chris Lawler of The Pharmacy on Northbourne, said. "We have no extra capacity. The limiting constraint here is our resources."
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Between 30 and 40 people were being vaccinated a day at Capital Chemist O'Connor, pharmacist Christine Nguyen said.
Very few people were uneasy about having the booster vaccines of Moderna or Pfizer because they had been given AstraZeneca for the first two jabs.
Mr Lawler said that every time there's been a change of rules on boosters, such as lowering the qualification time after the second dose, there was a rush of demand.
He said that some Canberra pharmacies couldn't book people in for boosters until March.
He had also met people who had had COVID and who were putting off the booster, at least for a while. "My message is once you are well, come and have the booster," he said.
Some pharmacists complained that official information was scarce, and they were relying on customers who had watched press conferences or on information in the media.
"There seems to be policy decisions on the fly and we get told through The Canberra Times," one said.
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