In late May, the ABC’s flagship current affairs program 4 Corners ran an episode on the slow pace of Australia’s vaccination roll-out.

There was a revealing moment late in the program, during an interview with Gold Coast Hospital infectious disease specialist, John Gerrard. Surveying the global pandemic, Gerrard made a gloomy prediction: COVID would eventually take hold in his community. ‘I think we’ll have small outbreaks, and they’ll get bigger, and eventually, we’ll lose control, and it will spread,’ he told the ABC’s Adam Harvey.