Regional Victorians eligible for the monkeypox vaccine are being forced to wait because country public health units have yet to receive the shots.
Health Minister Mary-Anne Thomas said the current direction for people meeting the eligibility criteria for the vaccine was to contact their local public health unit and vaccination would be arranged.
But in an email obtained by ABC Central Victoria from a person attempting to book in for a monkeypox vaccine in Bendigo, they were told the Loddon Mallee Public Health unit — which has been listed by the state government as rolling out the vaccine for the region — "will soon be receiving an extremely limited supply (10 doses in total) for administration as pre-exposure prophylaxis".
Due to the lack of supply, the email said the vaccine would first be offered to those "living with HIV infection who have had a sexually transmitted infection within the last 12 months".
This person had previously been advised to contact one of the five medical centres in Melbourne to "access the vaccine" while the Loddon Mallee Public Health Unit waited for their supply to arrive.
A Department of Health spokesperson advised the vaccines were "being held centrally" but regional public health units could contact the department if they had patients that met the eligibility criteria for vaccination "to arrange for delivery".
At the end of July, Australia's Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly labelled the increasing presence of monkeypox in the country a "communicable disease incident of national significance".
Professor Kelly's remarks followed the World Health Organization's declaration the spread of the virus to more than 70 countries represented a global "public health emergency".
Regional people left behind
Sean Mulcahy from Latrobe University's Australian Research Centre in Sex Health and Society said it was disappointing regional people had been left behind.
"City of Ballarat has a higher percentage of LGBTQIA+ people than the City of Melbourne, yet City of Melbourne has a clinic, and we here don't," he said.
"We need to reorient the city-centric approach towards the vaccine rollout and think about targeting communities in regional Victoria, who might be at risk."
As of August 5, there have been 22 cases of monkeypox recorded in Victoria and international research shows cases have been concentrated amongst gay and bisexual men who had sex with men who live in cities.
The monkeypox vaccine arrived in Australia on Monday and 3,500 doses were given to Victoria on Tuesday.
Dr Mulcahy said given the knowledge of infectious diseases and vaccines, and the past experience of gay men, he was disappointed by the rollout.
"The messaging needs to be much clearer, less confusing, and they need to clearly set out the steps for regional people to who are in those high-risk groups to access the vaccine," he said.
"We know in regional Victoria, we have more limited health services, particularly for gay and bisexual men who have sex with men.
" It's really important we support regional Victorians to get access to the vaccine as soon as possible.
"We need Minister Thomas to work with federal colleagues to get more vaccines into Victoria; and by that I mean all of Victoria — not just in the north and south of Melbourne."
Government looking into the issue
Ms Thomas said any miscommunication on the vaccine rollout was not "acceptable".
"The advice I have is that of people who are eligible can contact their local public health unit and that arrangement can be made for the vaccine," she said.
"If that's not the case, then I will certainly look into that because that would be very concerning.
"We obviously don't want people having to travel a great distance to get this vaccine.
"It is certainly our intention to ensure that the monkeypox vaccine is available as locally as close to home as possible."
A Department of Health spokesperson said further supplies of the vaccine were likely to be available from September 2022.
