Coronavirus

[MD Jazz]

newsGP - Latest hotel quarantine leak proves ‘we’re not learning’

Hotel quarantine has now been breached in every mainland state in Australia, leading experts to label the latest failure ‘Groundhog Day’.

www1.racgp.org.au

A good recent artic;le on this. Morrison should be leading this discussion. Pissweak by him and his government.

That's not to excuse Dan from running a shitshow but there has to be a national approach.

 

[IanG]

I understand, and agree with the 5 day lockdown once this highly transmissible variant of the virus got out into the community. My point is it should not have got out in the first place had Dan Andrews not ignored the PPE taskforce's recommendation that all HQ workers be issued with Tier 3 PPE.

An extra say $50k of Tier 3 PPE would have prevented the outbreak, and saved the state an estimated $500M to $1B

I'm not sure you can make that claim with any certainty.

 

[Nico]

I'm not sure you can make that claim with any certainty.

I can't but panel members of the PPE taskforce can:

It (that Tier 3 PPE was not assigned to all HQ workers) has left some members of the panel "flabbergasted".

"If the PPE taskforce is not the group to set the standards for these settings, who the hell is,'' one member asked.

"In the middle of the second wave, hospital staff often felt safer at the bedside of a COVID patient than at their local supermarket because the protection was so good".

"This would have stopped [hotel quarantine] staff getting sick and taking it into the community."

PPE taskforce member 'flabbergasted' stricter standards weren't applied in Victorian hotel quarantine

Victoria's beleaguered hotel quarantine program was not following the same infection control standards drawn up by a PPE taskforce, which were being applied to the rest of the state's health system.

www.abc.net.au

 

[Born_a_Tiger78]

My understanding is that the old Peter Macallum was not used, never needed.

But really, a better alternative to hotel quarantine should have been implemented 9 months ago as you say. Back then we all thought a vaccine would be maybe 2 years away so quarantine was going to be needed for a while.

DS

That's what I thought. The hospital was refurbished to cater for COVID patients, and for clarity not quarantine purposes, with the intent of reducing the burden on the health system. I have no issue with the forward planning of paying for the upgrade to occur.

I'm pretty sure that there was a contract in place to purchase/manufacture ventilators. From memory I don't think the contract was fulfilled.

The convention centre was also proposed to be upgraded into a hospital or morgue. Glad it wasn't required. Can't believe 2000-3000 smaller sheds weren't built, competively, for quarantine purposes last year.

 

[Sintiger]

That's what I thought. The hospital was refurbished to cater for COVID patients, and for clarity not quarantine purposes, with the intent of reducing the burden on the health system. I have no issue with the forward planning of paying for the upgrade to occur.

I'm pretty sure that there was a contract in place to purchase/manufacture ventilators. From memory I don't think the contract was fulfilled.

The convention centre was also proposed to be upgraded into a hospital or morgue. Glad it wasn't required. Can't believe 2000-3000 smaller sheds weren't built, competively, for quarantine purposes last year.

There were a number of overflow areas planned in case it got really bad. The old Peter Mac was one and there were other sites. There was also a lot of refurbishment done in hospitals to increase intensive care capability and the patients that would displace would have gone to the overflow hospitals, they were not refurbished for COVID patients but to create space in hospitals for COVID patients.
The state also purchased massive numbers of ventilators and other equipment and the vast majority was delivered and is still available.

 

[Sintiger]

I can't but panel members of the PPE taskforce can:

It (that Tier 3 PPE was not assigned to all HQ workers) has left some members of the panel "flabbergasted".

"If the PPE taskforce is not the group to set the standards for these settings, who the hell is,'' one member asked.

"In the middle of the second wave, hospital staff often felt safer at the bedside of a COVID patient than at their local supermarket because the protection was so good".

"This would have stopped [hotel quarantine] staff getting sick and taking it into the community."

PPE taskforce member 'flabbergasted' stricter standards weren't applied in Victorian hotel quarantine

Victoria's beleaguered hotel quarantine program was not following the same infection control standards drawn up by a PPE taskforce, which were being applied to the rest of the state's health system.

www.abc.net.au

To be clear there is a difference between what happens in the hot hotels (called Health Hotels) and the quarantine hotels. The Hot hotels infection control is run by the health system, in quarantine hotels it is not.
I would have thought an interesting question would be why has COVID escaped from what would be considered the lower risk hotels and not from those that are for patients who actually have COVID or are suspected to have it? Even when multiple patients were transferred last week from one hot hotel to a new one there were no problems, despite the ramblings of the media and the opposition.
Virginia Trioli asked that question during the week and maybe the answer might be the above?

 

[Nico]

To be clear there is a difference between what happens in the hot hotels (called Health Hotels) and the quarantine hotels. The Hot hotels infection control is run by the health system, in quarantine hotels it is not.
I would have thought an interesting question would be why has COVID escaped from what would be considered the lower risk hotels and not from those that are for patients who actually have COVID or are suspected to have it? Even when multiple patients were transferred last week from one hot hotel to a new one there were no problems, despite the ramblings of the media and the opposition.
Virginia Trioli asked that question during the week and maybe the answer might be the above?

Sin, I understand that hot hotels are controlled by the health department, and cold hotels by the justice department, both departments which fall under the Andrews Government. Correct?

The PPE taskforce said that anyone in quarantine should be treated as "high risk" regardless of whether or not they had tested positive for coronavirus. This means cold hotels and hot hotels. "High Risk" means that the person should be treated as a tier 3 risk — the same as a confirmed case. Tier 3 PPE requires N95 masks, face shields or goggles, and disposable gowns.

The Andrew government ignored the recommendation by the PPE taskforce in cold hotels, which is where the latest outbreak occurred, and subsequently the state was locked down for 5 days.

As for your "interesting" question, COVID escaped from a cold hotel because the HQ workers were not wearing Tier 3 PPE as per the recommendations.

I would really appreciate the courtesy of an answer to the following simple question, which no one thus far has been able to answer, why did the Andrews government ignore the PPE taskforce's recommendation and not have HQ workers in cold hotels decked out in Tier 3 PPE?

 

[Sintiger]

Sin, I understand that hot hotels are controlled by the health department, and cold hotels by the justice department, both departments which fall under the Andrews Government. Correct?

The PPE taskforce said that anyone in quarantine should be treated as "high risk" regardless of whether or not they had tested positive for coronavirus. This means cold hotels and hot hotels. "High Risk" means that the person should be treated as a tier 3 risk — the same as a confirmed case. Tier 3 PPE requires N95 masks, face shields or goggles, and disposable gowns.

The Andrew government ignored the recommendation by the PPE taskforce in cold hotels, which is where the latest outbreak occurred, and subsequently the state was locked down for 5 days.

As for your "interesting" question, COVID escaped from a cold hotel because the HQ workers were not wearing Tier 3 PPE as per the recommendations.

I would really appreciate the courtesy of an answer to the following simple question, which no one thus far has been able to answer, why did the Andrews government ignore the PPE taskforce's recommendation and not have HQ workers in cold hotels decked out in Tier 3 PPE?

Don't ask me Nico I am not defending it nor am I defending the Andrews government

My only small comment is on your statement "As for your "interesting" question, COVID escaped from a cold hotel because the HQ workers were not wearing Tier 3 PPE as per the recommendations."

Whilst I agree that is probably true the evidence is also very strong that if the person was in a Hot hotel the nebuliser would never have been used and it wouldn't have mattered about the PPE, in that case. When he was transferred to a hot hotel when he was found to be COVID positive the nebuliser was replaced because advice was sought from an expert at a Public hospital which wasn't done when he was in a quarantine hotel.

 

[Baloo]

I doubt they ignored the recommendation in the report. It's more likely they considered it and consciously decided not to follow it.

The question is what was their reasoning for that.

 

[Nico]

Don't ask me Nico I am not defending it nor am I defending the Andrews government

My only small comment is on your statement "As for your "interesting" question, COVID escaped from a cold hotel because the HQ workers were not wearing Tier 3 PPE as per the recommendations."

Whilst I agree that is probably true the evidence is also very strong that if the person was in a Hot hotel the nebuliser would never have been used and it wouldn't have mattered about the PPE, in that case. When he was transferred to a hot hotel when he was found to be COVID positive the nebuliser was replaced because advice was sought from an expert at a Public hospital which wasn't done when he was in a quarantine hotel.

But the returned traveller wasn't in a hot hotel, he was in a cold hotel and passed the virus onto a HQ worker (due to the HQ worker's lack of sufficient PPE). The HQ worker then went home and it spread into the community, and Victoria was locked down. The nebuliser is another story (nebuliser guy insists that he was given permission to use it and wants an inquiry. The Govt denies this).

I'm sure you agree that prevention is better than a cure, and spending a small amount of money on Tier 3 PPE (as per the recommendations) would have save a lot of heart ache.

 

[Nico]

I doubt they ignored the recommendation in the report. It's more likely they considered it and consciously decided not to follow it.

The question is what was their reasoning for that.

Ignored the recommendations, considered and rejected them, I think you are splitting hairs.

Why didn't the Andrew Govt implement the recommendations of the taskforce in cold hotels?

Listen, I'm no right wing nutbag, I voted for Andrews in 2014 and he personally helped my medical business when he was Shadow Health Minister around 2008. I jumped off him when he signed the MOU for the BRI prior to the 2018 election and refused to release details of it until after the election.

 

[Baloo]

Ignored the recommendations, considered and rejected them, I think you are splitting hairs.

Why didn't the Andrew Govt implement the recommendations of the taskforce in cold hotels?

Listen, I'm no right wing nutbag, I voted for Andrews in 2014 and he personally helped my medical business when he was Shadow Health Minister around 2008. I jumped off him when he signed the MOU for the BRI prior to the 2018 election and refused to release details of it until after the election.

No, I'm not splitting hairs at all. There is a distinct difference between ignoring something and considering it but deciding to go another way. To ignore a recommendation like that would be negligent, which is what you are constantly implying. They would have made a conscious decision not to do it.

If you want to understand why something has gone wrong, you need to understand what the rationale was behind the decisions made. It could very well be incompetence, but only by understanding why a decision was made can you look to improve it the next time around. That's not just with Dan the Man, it's in any situation when you trying to understand what the root cause is.

 

[Nico]

No, I'm not splitting hairs at all. There is a distinct difference between ignoring something and considering it but deciding to go another way. To ignore a recommendation like that would be negligent, which is what you are constantly implying. They would have made a conscious decision not to do it.

If you want to understand why something has gone wrong, you need to understand what the rationale was behind the decisions made. It could very well be incompetence, but only by understanding why a decision was made can you look to improve it the next time around. That's not just with Dan the Man, it's in any situation when you trying to understand what the root cause is.

If you don't implement a recommendation by a panel of infection control experts which would have prevented the HQ worker from getting the virus and spreading it to the community, particularly after 800 lives were lost due to the bungled HQ program in 2020, then you are either A) arrogant...what do those so-called experts know. I know better than them, or B) incompetent.

 

[Tigers of Old]

Great that there were no cases again today.

 

[Born_a_Tiger78]

There were a number of overflow areas planned in case it got really bad. The old Peter Mac was one and there were other sites. There was also a lot of refurbishment done in hospitals to increase intensive care capability and the patients that would displace would have gone to the overflow hospitals, they were not refurbished for COVID patients but to create space in hospitals for COVID patients.
The state also purchased massive numbers of ventilators and other equipment and the vast majority was delivered and is still available.

That makes sense - the refurbishments. A question, do you know that, if say, 2000 ventilators were needed tomorrow (or Monday to avoid penalty rates), a fleet of trucks could collect and deliver them?

 

[MD Jazz]

If you want to understand why something has gone wrong, you need to understand what the rationale was behind the decisions made. It could very well be incompetence, but only by understanding why a decision was made can you look to improve it the next time around. That's not just with Dan the Man, it's in any situation when you trying to understand what the root cause is.

Ultimately if the rationale proves wrong who takes the fall? Dan committed to improving hotel quarantine after the inquiry.

A Stronger Quarantine Program To Protect What We’ve Built | Premier of Victoria

The Victorian Government has unveiled a new, stronger quarantine program and a dedicated agency to oversee it enabling Victorians and visitors to safely start returning from overseas. As part of the Government’s response to the interim report of the Hotel Quarantine Inquiry, Premier Daniel...

www.premier.vic.gov.au

After how many slip ups does he start being accountable?

 

[MD Jazz]

The below paragraph is quite revealing

Regular, independent audits will be carried out at all hotels, as recommended by the Board of Inquiry, to identify any issues or improvements and monitor compliance with best-practice infection prevention and control measures.

 

[MD Jazz]

"All hotels" and "best-practice infection prevention and control measures"

Isn't that exactly the point Nico was raising?

Emma Cassar might be next to go.

 

[Sintiger]

But the returned traveller wasn't in a hot hotel, he was in a cold hotel and passed the virus onto a HQ worker (due to the HQ worker's lack of sufficient PPE). The HQ worker then went home and it spread into the community, and Victoria was locked down. The nebuliser is another story (nebuliser guy insists that he was given permission to use it and wants an inquiry. The Govt denies this).

I'm sure you agree that prevention is better than a cure, and spending a small amount of money on Tier 3 PPE (as per the recommendations) would have save a lot of heart ache.

I didn’t express myself well. My only point is that if we had the same people in charge of infection control in a hot hotel as a quarantine hotel the nebuliser would have never been used.
I have absolutely zero doubt that he was given permission to use it in the quarantine hotel. Not necessarily by some senior person but by someone

 

[Sintiger]

That makes sense - the refurbishments. A question, do you know that, if say, 2000 ventilators were needed tomorrow (or Monday to avoid penalty rates), a fleet of trucks could collect and deliver them?

Don’t know if it is 2000 but the amount needed are either in state warehouses are being stored in public hospitals
If we as a state had to stand up 100s of extra ICU beds we could from an equipment perspective.