A candidate from this year’s RACGP election has been cautioned for sharing a social media post that described COVID-19 vaccination as “so safe you have to be threatened to take it”.  

But Dr Julian Fidge, who received 390 of the 6400 primary votes in the college election, argues his aim was to “engage with the vaccine-hesitant in order to get them vaccinated”, and he is taking his legal fight to the Supreme Court of Victoria. 

The legal battle began in August 2021 when the Medical Board of Australia responded to a complaint about a post that Dr Fidge republished on his personal Facebook account. 

It consisted of an illustration (see image below) of a disintegrating skull with the message: “A vaccine so safe you have to be threatened to take it. A virus so dangerous you have to take a test to know you have it.”