Pushing for rural health teams

STATE public health teams should be established permanently across regional Victoria, Senator Sarah Henderson says.

She said the move would help avoid confusion during virus outbreaks and bring forward critical public health decisions to protect the community.

“It took the state government more than two days to declare that every worker (at the Australian Lamb Company abattoir in Colac) was deemed to be a close contact and should be tested and required to self-isolate,” Senator Henderson said.

“As a result, many abattoir workers moved through the Colac community, unaware of the risk they posed to others.

“As a regional senator for Victoria, I am deeply concerned about the confusion which arose at the Colac abattoir after one contractor was discovered to be positive.

“Colac Area Health and the Colac abattoir were proactive in how they responded, determining that everyone should be tested. But they did not have enough public health support and leadership on the ground.”

This week the outbreak from the Australian Lamb Company has grown to more than 50 cases.

Senator Henderson said public health teams were located in many parts of New South Wales, but in Victoria, its single public health team was in Melbourne’s CBD.

“While Barwon Health has now taken on a public health contact tracing role, it does not have the power to issue public health orders,” she said.

“Permanent public health teams located across regional Victoria would have the capacity to support local communities as soon as any issue arose, including the power to make public health decisions such as workplace closures and self-isolation orders.”

Earlier this month the state government announced a team of 10 qualified public health clinicians would be based at Barwon Health to deal with an increase of COVID-19 cases in the Geelong region.