Coronavirus Australia live update: Victoria reports six deaths and 532 Covid-19 cases and NSW 17 new cases

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Coronavirus Australia live update: Victoria reports six deaths and 532 Covid-19 cases and NSW 17 new cases

Sutton said he is not aware of any aged care facility that is short of PPE.

Obviously the commonwealth has made a commitment to all facilities in Victoria to provide PPE as is required. Again, it is not the whole solution. You have to wear it properly, you have to wear it both in terms of your provision of care to residents, but also between staff and, indeed, on the way to and from work because these are all opportunities for those staff to get infected.

He said a “significant number” of aged care workers have tested positive, “coming to hundreds now”.

So between those who are infected and those who are close contacts and need to be in quarantine, the number is hundreds. So it’s a significant impact.

Back in Victoria, the chief health officer Brett Sutton said the majority of the 683 active cases linked to aged care outbreaks in Victoria are residents.

He said the biggest outbreaks also included a number of staff who had tested positive.

When you got a number of staff who might be transmitting to each other, or are infecting residents and maybe getting infected by residents, that makes the size of an outbreak much more significant. It is unusual to have, you know, 60, 70, 80 cases in residences without multiple staff being infected.

He said some cases had spread because of staff working casually at more than one aged care facility, which is why that had been curbed earlier this month.

We knew that that had challenges for some casualised workers, but we knew how critically important it was. Again, lessons from Europe that multiple outbreaks across multiple settings happened because of that mobile workforce, and so that has been addressed and that will limit the number of aged care facilities that are affected in Victoria but it’s not the only solution.

New South Wales recorded 17 new cases of Covid-19 to 8pm last night.

Of those, eight are international travellers in hotel quarantine. Another four are linked to the funeral gatherings cluster, three are household contacts of cases associated with Thai Rock Wetherill Park, and two are under investigation.
There are now 70 cases linked to the cluster at Thai Rock Wetherill Park. The Crossroads Hotel cluster, which did not record any new cases yesterday, is at 56.

The chief health officer, Professor Brett Sutton, said Victoria was at a “very challenging stage” of the outbreak.

That’s in part because those infected are, on average, younger and of working age, and infected at the workplace.

Our areas of transmission are occurring in workplaces, mostly essential workplaces, and that it’s spilling over into aged care. The aged care outbreaks are absolutely a consequence of community transmission, but they represent a tragedy for the families involved for some private aged care facilities, the numbers are disturbing.

There are 84 cases connected to St Basil’s home for the aged in Fawkner, 82 at Estia aged care, 77 at Epping Gardens aged care in Epping, 62 in Menarock life aged care in Essendon, 53 at Glenndale aged care in Werribee, 57 in Kirk Bray presbyterian homes in Kilsyth and 50 in Estia aged care in Heidelberg.

Said Sutton:

It’s hard to read these out without considering the residents in these facilities will be people’s parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and they are at significant risk of dying. That’s an inescapable fact in these settings. Where there are outbreaks in aged care, the mortality is extremely high.

He urged aged care workers not to go to work when they have symptoms.

I understand that there’ll be people who’ll turn up and who’s develop symptoms while they’re at work. That’s where mask-wearing comes into place, not only in aged care, but all the settings we have been talking about.

Andrews said there were 150 additional on-site inspections by WorkSafe last week, particularly in high-risk worksites, and he would report on the findings of those inspections on compliance later.

In the main, those WorkSafe inspectors have found employers to be doing the right thing, employees to be doing the right thing, people taking this very, very seriously, but if we got further information along those lines, then we’re more than happy to continue to provide that.

Andrews said he had been told that some people were concerned about getting tested because they thought that testing positive to the coronavirus would lead to discrimination against them.

He said that should not happen, and people should be “proud” to get tested because it showed they were helping the community.

I do want to address that issue where I had a bit of feedback from people that there might be some reticence to come forward.

There might be a sense that you would be looked upon badly, that you would be somehow judged, that you would be not necessarily seen as doing the right thing – nothing could be further from the truth. Nothing could be further from the truth. If you have symptoms coming forward and getting tested, it will be something we’ll be grateful for and it’s you making a powerful contribution and doing the right thing.

Beyond that, to not go to work because you feel sick to give us a list of names, to speak to people who you have been in contact with because you have got a positive diagnosis, that’s something to be proud of and every Victorian who is doing that, I am very, very proud of you and very grateful to you.

… It’s wildly infectious, it doesn’t discriminate, it is in no way a commentary on who you are, your family, your circumstances, it doesn’t discriminate. And on that basis, we’re all in this together, we’re all susceptible to it and to protect your family, to protect rather than embarrassing your family, you are protecting your family and every single family.

Andrews said the lockdown in Melbourne will not end so long as people continue to go to work with Covid-19 symptoms.

The key message today for every single Victorian, regardless of where they work and regardless of where they live, you simply can’t go to work if you have symptoms.

You can’t go to work if you feel sick even mildly. You got to come forward and get tested.

He added:

This is what is driving these numbers up and the lockdown will not end until people stop going to work with symptoms and instead go and get tested because they have symptoms.

It’s not a matter of blame, it’s not a matter of judgment, these are the facts and unless we see a change, then we’re going to continue to see these numbers at unacceptably high levels. So, please, do something that will we will all be so grateful for – act on your symptoms.

Andrews said they continued to see people, including people in aged care, who were going to work when they were sick or had symptoms.

This is the biggest driver, it’s not the only issue, but it is the biggest driver of transmission. It is the biggest driver of these numbers going up rather than going down.

Victorian premier Daniel Andrews said there are now 245 people in hospital in Victoria with Covid-19, including 44 in intensive care.

The six people who have died in the past 24 hours are a woman in her 90s, a woman in her 80s, a man in his 80s, a woman in her 70s, a man in his 70s, and a man in his 50s.

Andrews said:

Five of those six deaths are connected to outbreaks in aged care. Beyond that, there are 4,542 total active cases, 683 active cases connected in some way to aged care.

And around 400 health workers who are active cases as of the situation report first thing this morning.

Victoria has recorded 532 new cases of coronavirus in the past 24 hours and six more deaths.

That’s a new daily record for case numbers.

Morrison has announced a new set of members for a revamped National Covid-19 Coordination Commission, which will still be helmed by the former Fortescue Metals executive Nev Power.

The commission was established on 25 May to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus on business and manage procurement and supply issues during the first round of shutdowns.

Today, Morrison said, he has re-established the commission as “an advisory board to myself as prime minister to work across the full spectrum of our jobmaker plan”.

We draw our advice from many sources over the course of the pandemic. We have been careful to listen and to listen carefully. We obviously have listened to the health advice, but also we have been listening to the economic advice whether it is from the Treasury or the Reserve Bank or listening to those in the industry sectors, the unions and others who we have drawn advice from through the various processes we have had.

Equally, we have been listening carefully to those in the economy who have had tremendous experience in many different sectors that has come through the Covid Coordination Commission. Today, as I said, we are re-establishing that commission and drawing together some new members who we believe will give it a broader spectrum of experience and expertise.

Greg Combet and Catherine Tanna, the managing director of Energy Australia, have stood down as part of the new commission.

Former Bendigo Bank boss Mike Hearst, former Transurban CFO Samantha Hogg, agriculture and rural Australia expert Su McCluskey, Rolld restaurant chain founder Bao Hoang, former AWU national secretary Paul Howes, and Indigenous business expert Laura Berry are joining the commission.

Morrison said people in aged care who test positive to Covid-19 are being moved into hospital. It sounds, from what he just said, that everyone is being moved, but the federal aged care minister Richard Colbeck said earlier this morning that those moves were only happening on a case-by-case basis.

One of the key things being done in the aged care sector currently is transferring people who have contracted Covid into hospital facilities and we are making use of the private hospital as agreement that we put in place some months ago to free up beds in the private hospital area so we can transfer people out of those facilities into those beds, and we are working closely with the Victorian state government about that process.

I was in contact earlier today with the premier on those issues.

On PPE, Morrison said the federal government has put 1.5m masks into aged care facilities, but says that the responsibility for putting PPE in aged care is shared between the federal and state governments.

I should stress that the commonwealth is not the only level of government that provides PPE material into the health system. Of course the state governments also do that and, in fact, are the primary providers of that equipment into healthcare facilities in their jurisdiction. But the national stockpile is being drawn upon to support their efforts to ensure that is in place.

It is vital that in those aged-care facilities that those infection control procedures are being followed. The commonwealth put in place training for infection control in relation to Covid in recent months and it is a matter now of ensuring that those infection control procedures are being adhered to strictly in those facilities. Because, obviously in aged-care facilities you are dealing with the most vulnerable members of our community and that is where you see the most awful of the consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic. That is where the loss of life, in particular occurs, far more significantly than any other part of the community.

Morrison said the outbreak in aged care in Melbourne, which by Sunday had grown to 560 cases across 71 residential and non-residential aged care facilities, was a reminder that when community transmission increases, people living in aged care are at risk.

It is important to understand that the challenges – and they are significant in the aged care sector – are a reminder that when community transmission occurs with Covid-19, the aged care sector will all be impacted. That is certainly the experience we have seen in other countries. When you have problems in aged care, it is a function of the community transmission.

Now, this is an important point to note because it involves all of us. If you want to protect the most vulnerable in our community, that is why it is so important. Those of us who are in a less vulnerable position, are continuing to follow the advice, performing the safe distancing and other practices about getting tested and remaining isolated when you are a close contact. All of this is incredibly important because when community transmission takes place, it is inevitable that it will find its way into the poor vulnerable parts of our community, and the aged care community is certainly one of those.

The prime minister, Scott Morrison, is speaking in Sydney about the joint coordination centre for the aged care response, which is being stood up today.

The federal opposition leader, Anthony Albanese, told 2SM radio this morning that Labor has some questions about the impact of the changes to the jobkeeper program, announced last week.

He said he was concerned that the brief window between outbreaks in Melbourne, and the window with lower restrictions in Sydney, would mean that some businesses would fail the income test because they had one month of stronger revenue.

For example, businesses having to prove that their income has gone down on two quarters means that for some, what happens in places like Melbourne and happened in Sydney too, when people had restrictions lifted, they went and got out and about.

So, for example, I know in Victoria, places that were visited by a whole lot of people who arrived there. So, their incomes went up in June, but they’ve gone straight back down again at the moment because of the reimposition of restrictions. And so, the concern there is that some might miss out. And that will add to those who have missed out from the very beginning like casual workers.

We also think that there’s a concern about just a failure to look forward. That’s reflected in the fact that there’s still no increase in jobseeker payments. The government’s put its hand up and they admitted that $40 a day isn’t enough to live on. Well, they should give some certainty there, we believe.

The organisers of tomorrow’s Black Lives Matter rally in Sydney say they are still trying to “negotiate an alternative plan of gathering in the Domain” to allow the protest to go ahead.

The supreme court yesterday ruled in favour of a police application to prohibit the protest from going ahead.

In a Facebook post, organisers of the rally told supporters:

We are trying to negotiate an alternative plan of gathering in the Domain – Djarrbarrgalli, a huge public space just behind NSW Parliament House. We will be able to spread out there and abide by the Covid-19 regulations if people stay in groups of less than 20. We are still fighting in court for our original plan… If we succeed in court however, we will try and negotiate with police to allow us to alter the Form 1 to begin in the Domain.

Black Lives Matter organisers say they’ll call off Sydney rally if premier seeks Dungay death investigation

Source: The Guardian |NewsColony

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