Covid-19 vaccination rates among Māori are only about two-thirds of those of the general population, a figure which is worrying health officials.
Only 55 percent of Māori have had their first dose, and a little more than half of that figure have been fully vaccinated.
Critics of the vaccination roll-out have repeatedly said Māori should've been prioritised, and the Government approach was too Anglo-centric.
Te Rōpū Whaka-kaupapa Urutā co-leader Rawiri Jansen, says he's troubled by the low vaccination rates.
"I am concerned that an outbreak in under vaccinated Māori could be catastrophic," he said.
"So I really endorse mainstream New Zealand accepting that it will take three or four or five extra weeks to get us, the Māori population, into the right place with respect to protection from Covid by being vaccinated, and that's an all of our interests to do that.
Having mass outbreaks of Covid will affect the health system for everybody, so it's in our interest to make sure that we have a vaccination program that reaches 95 percent of eligible Māori."
Dr Jansen says the decision not to prioritise all Māori in the initial roll-out is now back firing.
"Because Māori weren't prioritized early in the vaccination rollout they've actually been exposed to much more anti-vax or vax hesitant kind of messaging for much longer period of time.
"That shouldn't have happened, we could have done this differently, but it has happened now we've got to do extra work to get to the right place."
He says there's widespread distrust in the Government among Māori, which makes the job ahead much more difficult.
"We've had a health crisis for at least 10 years, which has left a significant community of people experiencing very bad housing, cold, damp, overcrowded, people who are moving from place to place or being housed in motels.
"That's a very significant number. I think most people don't realize how big that population is, and that population is not feeling loved by the community.
"They're not feeling supported by the government, they're not about to suddenly have somebody arrive and go, 'we're here to help'. I think they're going to say, 'you haven't helped for 10 years, what are you talking about, you're here to help?'
"So there'll be a huge reservoir of distrust of the government because of the experiences that a fairly significant number of people have had with respect to housing."
