The ‘no jab, no pay’ policy appears to have encouraged Australian parents to get their children’s vaccination records up to date, a study shows. 

Introduced in 2016, the policy has resulted in “substantial catch-up vaccinations” against some diseases, especially in lower socio-economic status areas, the researchers report in the Medical Journal of Australia. 

The proportion of incompletely vaccinated children aged five to seven years who received a third dose of diphtheria–tetanus–pertussis vaccine (DTPa3), was 65% higher under the ‘no jab, no pay’ policy than during the two years previously. 

Under the measure, 15.5% of children received catch up doses of DTPa3, compared with 9.4% in the period before the policy.