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BENDIGO'S COVID-19 vaccination centre has confirmed it will offer Pfizer jabs to people aged 16 to 39 years of age from Wednesday along with others across the state.
There will be no walk-in appointments.
People can register for an appointment by visiting www.bendigohealth.org.au/registerforvaccine
12.50pm
VICTORIA'S booking system appears to have crashed less than an hour after premier Daniel Andrews announced people as young as 16 could get the Pfizer vaccine.
He has told reporters he is not surprised by those reports.
"I don't know if you can build a website big enough for over 1.2 million people who want to get vaccinated," Mr Andrews said.
"We are never happy to see systems overwhelmed, but it speaks to the point... [that] people want to get vaccinated really, really fast."
Mr Andrews has urged people to be patient if trying to book an appointment.
12.40pm
YEAR 12 students will have to wait for more guidance on whether they will be at the front of the queue for the Pfizer vaccine despite their age cohort being allowed to book for the jab from Wednesday.
"We will have more to say about prioritisation for our students," Premier Daniel Andrews told reporters on Tuesday.
He said the National Cabinet discussed the matter on Friday and that Victoria had indicated it wanted Year 12s to have their first dose by the end of the school year.
Yet the sheer number of jabs the state wanted to get into people's arms made that no easy task, Mr Andrews said.
"It is important not to make announcements you can't back up. We will make this announcement soon."
12.25pm
PREMIER Daniel Andrews says not everyone will be able to get vaccinated tomorrow "because we don't have supply for everybody".
But he has urged people to book online and turn up at a designated appointment time some time over the next four weeks.
He has just announced all people aged 16 to 39 years old will be eligible for Pfizer vaccinations from Wednesday.
"There isn't at this stage enough for every single person who will want to come forward and make a booking, but if we can get these appointments out the door - if we can get these jabs into arms over the next four weeks - we will achieve our target, and probably do better than that," Mr Andrews said.
Bendigo Health has been contacted to find out more about how the change will affect the city's vaccination delivery.
Mr Andrews urged those who already had appointments not to cancel and get back in the queue.
"There is nothing, I think, worse than the notion of someone who has booked in who then makes a choice of instead of getting the jab today, they will join a queue tomorrow," he said.
"Of I know this is always challenging ... the last day of one eligibility period and the first day of a new one, that's the nature of opening up this slowly, and the nature of not necessarily having every dose we need on day one."
Mr Andrews urged people to be patient as authorities braced for a surge in booking requests.
He said extra people were being put on to process them but that there might be delays.
11.50am
ALL people aged 16 to 39 will be eligible for Pfizer as Victorian authorities become increasingly confident that does will arrive from tomorrow.
Premier Daniel Andrews said it would essentially open the Pfizer program for nearly all Victorians.
"Only one slight caveat on that - 16 and 17-year-olds are not eligible for Astra," he said.
The government has also announced it will open up 830,000 first dose appointments as authorities become increasingly confident it will smash its targets for getting jabs into arms.
More than 41,000 vaccine appointments are up for grabs across the state and Mr Andrews urged people to book in as soon as possible.
"They are a mix, pretty much 50/50 of Pfizer and Astra. Please, if you are watching this now or listening to it, please go online, book an appointment," he said.
Earlier
Victoria has recorded 51 new coronavirus cases since Monday.
The new COVID-19 cases included 50 in the community and one in hotel quarantine.
Of the 50 local cases recorded, 40 are linked to current outbreaks and 10 are under investigation.
Read more:
Just 11 of Victoria's 50 new local cases has been in quarantine during their infections period.
Victoria's active coronavirus case tally now sits at 522.
Tuesday also bought 48,424 test results to Victorians as well as 29,810 vaccinations being administered.
The numbers come as two major Bendigo events were cancelled for the second year in a row on Monday.
The escalating coronavirus situation in Victoria has led to the Bendigo Blues and Roots Music Festival to be postponed until 2022.
Festival director Colin Thompson said the current situation with Victoria in lockdown made it difficult to be able to hold a full-scale festival.
"We're still looking at what we can do on the weekend our festival was scheduled to occur (4-7 November), with a couple of strong possibilities in mind, but there's no way our team and our partner venues can feasibly look to do what was planned this year," he said.
"We're really appreciative of the support and understanding shown to us by our sponsors, partner venues, and of course the crew at (City of Greater Bendigo's) tourism and major events team and we hope to be able to announce the new date in the coming days."
Organisers also made the difficult decision to call off this year's Relay for Life event on Monday.
The event, which had been moved to August 28, raises money for the Cancer Council and recognises and celebrates local cancer survivors, patients and their carers along with honouring and remembering loved ones lost to cancer.
While organisers were hopeful to get the event back on its feet, committee member Athol Frederick said cancelling was the only option.
"It was a very difficult decision, but one that we had to make," he said.
"After hearing the news over the weekend and being put into lockdown, we just couldn't go ahead.
"We would usually have our event in autumn so to move it to late winter was going to be odd anyway, but unfortunately we will probably have to wait until next year."
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