Home affairs minister suggests reports about Biloela daughter’s illness ‘inaccurate’
The home affairs minister, Karen Andrews, has suggested the youngest member of the Murugappan family from Biloela who was evacuated from Christmas Island for medical treatment was not as sick as had been reported.
Tharnicaa, who turned four on the weekend, remains in Perth Children’s hospital, where she is being treated for a blood infection caused by undiagnosed pneumonia.
Supporters of the family said she had been unwell for 10 days, with a fever, dizziness and vomiting. At several stages the family has said Tharnicaa was only given Panadol or Nurofen as treatment before she was eventually evacuated.
But the home affairs minister told Brisbane radio station 4BC on Wednesday much of the media reports about Tharnicaa’s medical condition were inaccurate, but would not say what was incorrect.
“I can’t answer anything that would give details of this child’s medical condition other than to say a lot of the reporting has been inaccurate,” Andrews said.
“The illness the child is suffering and is in hospital for has been well and truly treated in the advice I have been given. I need to leave it at that but I do need to correct the record to a point.”
Her hospital admission placed renewed pressure on the government to release the family, who have spent nearly two years in detention on Christmas Island, and return them to the Australian mainland.
A friend of the family, Angela Fredericks, who has supplied information on Tharnicaa’s health to media, said in a statement that throughout the process, the information the doctors gave the family was what she provided to media.
“We were told it was a blood infection and then some other medical professionals actually used blood infection and sepsis interchangeably. By Tuesday … it was confirmed to be a blood infection as a result of untreated pneumonia,” she said.
“We’ve described it as that ever since.”
Fredericks said Tharnicaa will require eight weeks of specialist care and follow-up in Perth.
“If the home affairs minister would like to suggest this situation is exaggerated in any way, she might like to liaise with those hard-working professionals before her next radio appearance.”
Guardian Australia has sought further clarification from Andrews office on what aspects of Tharnicaa’s health she believed had been overstated.
Psychiatry professor Louise Newman from Monash University, who has long had direct contact with detainees in offshore detention for their mental healthcare, said the claims made by the family are consistent with her understanding of the medical facilities on Christmas Island, particularly for the treatment of a child.
“The picture is entirely consistent with the facts that we know about inadequate medical facilities, particularly for children in a place like Christmas Island; these kind of issues have frequently come up on Nauru and Manus Island,” she said.
Tharnicaa and her mother Priya were reunited with father Nades and sister Kopika on Tuesday night in Perth after the immigration minister, Alex Hawke, announced the family would be allowed to live in community detention in Perth while he considers their case and legal actions continue. The government has repeatedly stated the decision to put them into community detention is not a pathway to permanent residency.
A group of Biloela locals, including Fredericks, are en route to Perth on Wednesday to visit the family.
The Australian Human Rights Commission recommended in a report released on Wednesday on managing the risk of a Covid-19 outbreak in immigration detention facilities that the Christmas Island detention centre should be closed.
“The island’s isolation and lack of sophisticated healthcare facilities would make it more difficult to respond as effectively as possible to a possible outbreak,” commissioner Ed Santow said. “The government should follow expert health advice by placing people who present a low security risk in community-based alternatives to closed detention – much as other comparable jurisdictions have done with success.”
In response, the Department of Home Affairs said there was appropriate health and welfare services on the island available for detainees.
“The services provided by International Health and Medical Services (IHMS) on Christmas Island are consistent with those provided to detainees in the mainland immigration detention network. Healthcare services for detainees are comparable to those available to the Australian community under the Australian public health system.”