The pandemic has been particularly hard for about half a million Australians whose immune systems are compromised.
These people represent 2 per cent of the country. They deserve to be heard and they deserve to be helped. It's time the health system made them a priority.
We've seen during the pandemic that older people, the Indigenous community and those with a disability have raised concerns at various times about a lack of good access to COVID vaccines.
We've also heard people say they want easier access to antiviral drugs that fight COVID in the first week of the disease, before it progresses to a more severe and deadly illness.
Now the transplant community is saying it wants better access to the federal government's stockpile of the monoclonal antibodies tixagevimab and cilgavimab, which come under the brand name Evusheld. The government bought 36,000 of these drugs from pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.
Hunter resident Victoria McGee has been rattling cages in health systems across the country, through her support group for the transplant community, asking why the drugs have not been rolled out efficiently.
In February, the TGA announced that it had given provisional approval to the antibody drugs, which prevent COVID.
"These antibodies bind to the spike protein of the SARS-CoV-2 virus at two different sites to stop the virus from entering the body's cells and causing infection," the TGA statement said.
Former federal health minister Greg Hunt had touted the drugs, saying they would provide a "promising new option" for immunocompromised people unable to have a COVID vaccine or "develop a robust immune response" to a vaccine.
It's now July, the third wave of COVID has arrived and many transplant patients haven't had access to the drug.
The health system has been under great pressure and the workers within this system should be shown empathy for the workload they've been under.
However, it's the job of the leaders of these health systems and their political masters to make sure important drugs - which the government has paid for with taxpayer money - are made available in an efficient and effective way.
It's particularly important that disadvantaged groups, such as the transplant community, not be an afterthought.
Ms McGee should be commended for leading the charge to help this community.
She has been collecting stories of fellow transplant recipients who are having trouble accessing the drug or being denied it.
As vaccines don't work well on these people as a rule, many continue to be isolated with no protection from the virus.
Health leaders across Australia should be doing all they can to help these people get access to drugs that could save their lives.
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