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AusVaxSafety wins Research Australia Data Innovation Award

The AusVaxSafety team has been recognised at Research Australia’s 19th Health and Medical Research Awards, winning the Data Innovation Award for our work in delivering nationally consistent vaccine safety surveillance in near-real time from the first day of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout, the largest and most complex immunisation program ever delivered in Australia.

The Data Innovation Award recognises innovative data collection, processing and analysis that advances health and medical research and is a testament to AusVaxSafety’s contribution to Australia’s robust vaccine safety monitoring system. 

AusVaxSafety Clinical Lead, Dr Lucy Deng said “Our success would not have been possible without the hard work of our expert team, our safety surveillance tools SmartVax and Vaxtracker, and our signal detection and data analytics team from the Telethon Kids Institute.”

“Collaboration and support from state, territory and federal health departments, immunisation providers, GPs and pharmacists underpinned the success of the surveillance system.”  

“Finally, I would like to thank all individuals who completed an AusVaxSafety vaccine safety survey following their COVID-19 vaccination. We now have more than 6.5 million responses in what has been an extraordinary example of citizen science in action,” continued Dr Deng.

Led by the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance (NCIRS) and funded by the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care, AusVaxSafety is a national active vaccine safety surveillance system that monitors adverse events following vaccination in Australia, and investigates those that are unusual or unexpected, to ensure continuing vaccine safety.

Since the start of the COVID-19 vaccination rollout out, AusVaxSafety has received more than 6.5 million COVID-19 vaccine safety surveys from across the country. These data - analysed by brand, dose, time since vaccination and other key demographics - have provided Australian policy makers and the general public a complete picture of how COVID-19 vaccines are performing in real-world conditions for more than the 2 years. 

Research Australia’s Health and Medical Research Awards recognises the outstanding efforts and achievements of individuals and teams who drive and support the opportunities that health and medical innovation bring to each and every one of our lives. 

AusVaxSafety would like to thank Research Australia for the award and extend our congratulations to all finalists.

See AusVaxSafety’s COVID-19 safety data here

Learn more about AusVaxSafety here