Much of what Mr Morrison had to say focused on comparing Australia's vaccine rollout with that of other countries. We are, in his eyes, apparently travelling well.

"Around 1.2 million Australians have been vaccinated in the first seven weeks. Over that period of time we've gone from around 30,000 a week to over 300,000 a week, and that number continues to climb ... Our vaccination rollout compared to the rest of the world is also on par [with] countries like Germany and Sweden and France."

That, with the greatest respect, sits oddly with the demonstrable reality that Australia's vaccination program fell dramatically short of the PM's earlier target of 4 million doses by the end of March, as well as earlier claims Australia's efforts would be world-beating.

Most people are far more interested in hearing what the government is going to do to get the program back on track than on repeated attempts to "lipstick the pig".

The anxiety is real. We have, in the last 24 hours, recorded Australia's 910^th COVID-19 fatality, and the second instance of blood clots linked to the AstraZeneca vaccine.

There are also fears that as the country moves into winter, any future hotel quarantine escape could spread through the community very quickly. That, after all, is what happened in Victoria last winter.

Now is the time for the government to openly acknowledge that, for a number of reasons, some of which were outside its control, it has overpromised and underdelivered on vaccines. It could then draw a line under this rocky start and move on.

The growing pressure to move towards mass vaccination centres, rather than just relying on the GP network, for when more Pfizer doses start arriving should be acted upon.

Planning for that should be under way now, not left to an ad hoc decision in two or three months' time.

That said, it is important to remember vaccines are just one element of the overall national public health response.

Production capacity and vaccine nationalism, two of the problems impeding Australia's rollout, were identified by WHO director-general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in a statement on Monday which appeared to praise the efforts of countries such as Australia and New Zealand in containing the virus.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that global manufacturing capacity is not sufficient to deliver vaccines and other essential health products quickly and equitably to where they are needed most," he said.

The director-general noted the week-on-week increases in global cases since late February, and the week-on-week increases in deaths since mid-March - despite the fact 780 million doses of vaccine had been administered.

"Make no mistake, vaccines are a vital and powerful tool. But they are not the only tool ... the countries that have done best have taken a tailored, measured, agile and evidence-based combination of measures".

Perhaps most importantly, the government needs to lift its communication game by taking the public and the press into its confidence.

While it is understandable if the PM is suffering from press conference fatigue, these issues are too important to be left to social media.

When the government doesn't provide accurate information, it leaves the door ajar for the type of fake news and conspiracy theories recently disseminated in Reid.

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