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Turns Out It Was Kevin Rudd, Not Scott Morrison, Who Sped Up Australia’s Pfizer Restock

"Theory: Kevin Rudd challenged the Pfizer chairman to a game of handball and when he won we got the vaccines expedited"

by Millie Roberts  12 July 2021
Kevin Rudd Pfizer

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Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has been credited with helping expedite Australia’s Pfizer restock, according to the ABC.

Reports say the Federal Government had bungled their initial negotiation with the pharmaceutical company last year, and Scott Morrison had added salt to the wound when he failed to speak directly with Pfizer’s Chairman and Chief Executive Albert Bourla, during this time.

Rudd stepped in after top business leaders called on him to intervene after seeing the poor vaccine rollout a year on.

He arranged a call with Bourla as a concerned citizen last month, asking if the CEO could “advance the dispatch of significant quantities of the Pfizer vaccine to Australia as early as possible in the third quarter this year.”

“Dr Bourla indicated that, if it became physically possible to bring forward delivery, he would require a further formal contractual request from the Australian government to that effect,” Rudd wrote to ScoMo as a follow-up on June 30.

Pfizer has since released a statement negating Rudd’s role, saying the suggestion “that any third party or individual has had any role in contractual agreements reached between Pfizer and the Australian Government are inaccurate.”

They stated that “Pfizer has a strong relationship with the Federal Government” and the “only two parties involved in these agreements are Pfizer and the Australian Government.”

Last Thursday, it was announced the Government had negotiated with Pfizer to boost weekly supply to up to 1 million doses this month, from the current 300,000 to 350,000 figure.

It’s important to note that Australia isn’t getting a larger quantity of Pfizer doses, but rather, fast-tracking what was already in the works. Pfizer has maintained its commitment to delivering 40 million vaccine doses this year.

“We have been working with Pfizer now for quite some period of time to bring forward our supplies,” Morrison said on the Today Show last Friday.

“The Australian government at all levels have been proactively and continuously engaged directly with Pfizer throughout the COVID-19 vaccine rollout,” a spokesperson for Health Minister Greg Hunt said to the ABC’s 7.30 program.

“While we were made aware of Mr Rudd’s approach, we are not aware this approach had any impact on the outcome.”

People are now hilariously asking Rudd to fix their personal woes as well, so can he help me file my tax return while he’s at it?

Photo: AAP