Now the election is over, time for political journalists to return to the greatest crisis facing the country.…

Now the election is over, time for political journalists to return to the greatest crisis facing the country. Covid. It’s clear the previous government workshopped spin to respond to the alarming number of ongoing weekly deaths from Covid. Some questions to ask…. #auspol /1

Firstly, it’s also clear the dominant spin response would be ‘yes but a lot of these people are dying with Covid, not from Covid’. That’s just a lie, and the ABS have given clear numbers to counter it. Some journalists even read them. /2 https://t.co/EdqyjsPZDv

Secondly, vaccination in States like NSW has basically stopped. The leaders who gave the green light to let Covid rip before Christmas justified that decision using vaccination. But nobody is getting vaccinated, and these same leaders are doing next to nothing about it. /2 https://t.co/AibpqjU9hc

It’s not just that people aren’t getting a 3rd dose. More than half the children in NSW for example have not had even ONE dose of vaccine. The same spin doctors will no doubt say people were given an ‘opportunity’ to be vaccinated. That’s public health dangerous nonsense. /3

Vaccination for example was already compulsory to access basic public facilities and services, like childcare and family tax benefits. The ‘No Jab No Play’ scheme. The idea that vaccination should be optional for a disease far more dangerous than…/4 https://t.co/l5b8KRZ3EX

…those you need to be vaccinated against to attend childcare almost defies belief. And while millions of vaccines are on the brink of being thrown away, at the same time Chief Health officers have been apparently marginalised, barely appearing any more in public. /5

Surely a journalist can look at all this and call it out for what it obviously is? The shutting down of a public health response to a pandemic? And to do enough basic research to not be immediately cowed by one of the counter-spin slogans they’ll face? /end