Covid fatigue pushes pandemic off agenda
SYDNEY: Australia has the highest per capita Covid19 infection rate in the world and about 40 people are dying from the virus every day there, but health authorities are concerned the pandemic has slipped off the national agenda.
Almost 7800 Australians have died from Covid19 since the start of the pandemic.
However, science and health writer Jane McCredie said, ‘‘we have pretty much stopped talking about the biggest challenge our health system has ever faced’’.
Last week, Australia had an estimated 350,000 active cases and by the end of December, just over 400,000 Australians had contracted the virus, she wrote in the InSight, the weekly online news magazine of the Medical Journal of Australia.
The total number of
Australians who have contracted the virus is now more than
6.45 million.
‘‘That’s more than five million people in five months, and it’s bound to be an underestimate given the move to reliance on selftesting,’’ she wrote.
Due to high vaccination rates, the disease is a lot less deadly than at the start of the pandemic, although dozens of people are still dying every day.
‘‘The reduction in mortality is no doubt one of the factors in our loss of interest, but a more compelling reason I suspect is that we are all simply exhausted,’’ she said.
Public Health Association of Australia chief executive Terry Slevin told the journal the disease had taken an extraordinary toll on frontline health workers.
Australian Medical Association vicepresident Chris Moy said a mix of fatigue and complacency had seen the virus shunted from the national spotlight.
He warned the health system needed to help thousands of Australians suffering from Long Covid, ‘‘which is, I think, something as a community we haven’t acknowledged’’. — AAP