Asylum seeker’s death ‘preventable’
AUSTRALIA must do more to care for asylum seekers held offshore after an Iranian man died in entirely preventable circumstances, Queensland’s state coroner says.
Hamid Khazaei would still be alive if he had received proper medical care after developing a leg infection at the Australian-run detention centre on Manus Island, according to coroner Terry Ryan.
But the 24-year-old died in a Brisbane hospital in September 2014, two weeks after seeking help at the centre’s medical clinic, which did not have the right kind of antibiotics.
Clinic staff failed to recognise his condition was rapidly deteriorating, there were delays getting him to hospital in Port Moresby, and there was nothing doctors could do by the time he was flown to Brisbane.
Mr Ryan recommended the Home Affairs Department enforce a new policy that puts the clinical needs of detainees first if they need medical transfers that require the approval of immigration authorities.
The coroner said there should also be mandatory inquests for asylum seekers who died in offshore centres, to keep the Government accountable.