Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has blamed restricted vaccine supply from Europe for his country's halting coronavirus inoculation efforts, as he faced down growing public frustration over the slow roll-out.
He said vaccine shortages and "strict export controls" introduced by the European Commission meant Australia received just 700,000 of a contracted 3.8 million doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine.
His government, which received global praise for successfully containing Australia's coronavirus outbreak, has fallen far behind its schedule for vaccinating people.
It had initially pledged to administer four million doses by the end of March, but had instead managed about 850,000 shots by today - drawing increasing criticism that