Queenslanders who have received three doses of a COVID-19 vaccine are 20 times less likely to die from the virus than those who remain unvaccinated, new data shows.
Queensland's total number of COVID-19 deaths passed 400 today, however Griffith University virologist Lara Herrero crunched yesterday's numbers revealing the likelihood of someone who has received the booster shot dying from the virus was about one in 61,000.
That compares to one person in every 3,000 unvaccinated people dying of COVID-19 and one in 5,500 Queenslanders who are double-dosed.
As of Wednesday, 399 Queenslanders had died with COVID-19, with 392 of the deaths occurring during the Omicron wave and since interstate borders reopened to hotspots on December 13.
Of those who died during the Omicron wave, 214 were double-dosed Queenslanders, 33 had received one COVID-19 jab, 103 were unvaccinated, and 42 were people who had been given three doses.
More than half — 208 — were aged care residents.
Boosted Queenslanders made up only 10.7 per cent of COVID-19 deaths during the past two months but Health Minister Yvette D'Ath said yesterday just 62 per cent of eligible residents aged 16 and older had received their third dose.
Dr Herrero said the data was clear: Having a booster shot was the best protection against COVID-19, on top of social distancing, mask wearing and hand hygiene.
"I would just hope that the population is not vaccine-fatigued.
"It takes 15 minutes to get a vaccination and it hurts a little bit in your arm, but it can save your life.
"I encourage everyone to look at the data and decide what's important to them."
Dr Herrero said it was not too late for unvaccinated Queenslanders to get their COVID-19 shots.
"The virus is still circulating out there," she said.
"We will see numbers rise again if we don't protect ourselves and our community."
Booster shot rate 'not high enough'
While double-dosed Queenslanders make up more than half of the state's COVID-19 deaths, Mater director of infectious diseases Paul Griffin says they also account for more than 90 per cent of the population aged 16 and older.
"If the vaccine was doing nothing, the deaths, cases, hospital admissions et cetera, should be nine times higher in the vaccinated than the unvaccinated, because they're 90 per cent of the population," Dr Griffin said.
"But that's not the case. The vaccine has a very high rate of effectiveness at reducing those outcomes, but it's not 100 per cent."
Australians aged 16 and older are eligible for a booster shot three months after receiving their second dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
Dr Griffin said the percentage of Queenslanders who had received a booster shot was "not high enough", despite evidence the Omicron peak had passed.
"There's going to be … some would say, a very long tail.
"We have established community transmission that we simply won't get rid of anytime soon and so there's always going to be an element of risk in the population of getting this infection and having adverse outcomes from it."
Nevertheless, Queensland Chief Health Officer John Gerrard said COVID-19 was a different disease than what doctors were seeing before vaccination.
"This disease is no longer like what was seen in New York, Italy and elsewhere in the early phase of the pandemic," Dr Gerrard said.
"What we're seeing now is very different because of vaccination.
"We're seeing much more complicated cases where you have older people, often with multiple medical problems, and often it's difficult to actually determine what extent the virus is playing a part in their illness."
