The Aged Care Minister has hit back at comments made at yesterday’s royal commission hearing that the aged care sector was “underprepared” to deal with COVID-19.
At the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety yesterday, counsel assisting Peter Rozen QC forensically examined the response of the aged care sector to COVID-19.
His findings were damning.
“Neither the Commonwealth Department of Health nor the aged care regulator developed a COVID-19 plan specifically for the aged care sector,” Mr Rozen said.
More than 1,000 aged care residents have now been infected with COVID-19, of whom 168 have died. Australia now has one of the highest rates of death in aged care homes in the world.
But on ABC Radio National this morning, the Aged Care Minister, Richard Colbeck hit back at those claims.
“We do have a plan,” he said, noting that the plan continues to “evolve” and “develop”, and incorporate learnings from both Newmarch House and Dorothy Henderson Lodge, as well as from overseas.
He said the government takes its advice from the Communicable Diseases Network of Australia, which has “served it well”.
He did not accept the assertion that advice about wearing masks, surge workforces, and staff working across homes, as well as other crucial matters, was provided too late.
Mr Colbeck also said he “was not happy” the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission did not tell the federal government that a staff member at St Basil’s had tested positive to COVID-19 until four days later.
“There was a gap in the systems,” he said. “They should have told us immediately.”
The Minister only became aware of the case when the Prime Minister Scott Morrison was informed.
Image: kali9, iStock.
