❓ Question regarding whether the Quarantine Advisory Panel provided advice on outsourcing hotel quarantine healthcare to Healthcare Australia. The Minister clarifies the arrangement and states the decision wasn't subject to the Panel's advice.
AnsweredQoN 156Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
CORONAVIRUS — HOTEL QUARANTINE CONTRACT —
HEALTHCARE AUSTRALIA
156. Ms M.J. DAVIES to the Minister for Health:
I refer to the state government's
Quarantine Advisory Panel established last Thursday and today's
announcement that WA's hotel quarantine arrangements would be
outsourced to Healthcare Australia to provide end-to-end health support
services, including all general practitioners, nurses and nursing assistants.
(1) Has the Quarantine Advisory
Panel met to provide advice to government on this matter?
(2) If not, why not?
HEALTHCARE AUSTRALIA
156. Ms M.J. DAVIES to the Minister for Health:
I refer to the state government's
Quarantine Advisory Panel established last Thursday and today's
announcement that WA's hotel quarantine arrangements would be
outsourced to Healthcare Australia to provide end-to-end health support
services, including all general practitioners, nurses and nursing assistants.
(1) Has the Quarantine Advisory
Panel met to provide advice to government on this matter?
(2) If not, why not?
AnswerView source ↗
(1)–(2) For
the record, I make it clear to members of Parliament exactly what the
announcement with regard to hotel quarantining healthcare arrangements
involved. The Department of Health, utilising the services of the East Metropolitan
Health Service, has been working with Healthcare Australia throughout the
global pandemic experience to provide healthcare services to guests in our
hotels. That includes a team of nurses and doctors who essentially provide
primary care for all guests in the event that they need attention. Healthcare
Australia has been working throughout this period as part of that team.
As a result of the ongoing pressures
that we continue to experience in our hospitals and the demands in particular
in relation to the workforce, it was considered appropriate that we make sure
that all our nurses who are currently working as part of the East Metropolitan
Health Service team but in our hotel quarantine system should be redeployed back onto the front line, making sure that
we have as many people as p ossible involved in our health system. I stress
that this does not mean that we have outsourced the security, administration or
oversight of hotel quarantine; it is simply that healthcare component, which,
as I said, is primarily a primary healthcare function. The decision has been
made that we will take those nurses and put them back in our health system. It
has not been subject to advice from the Quarantine Advisory Panel. It is pretty
commonsense that we should make sure that as many of our doctors and nurses as
possible are made available to our health system and continue to provide good
wraparound services for hotel guests.
the record, I make it clear to members of Parliament exactly what the
announcement with regard to hotel quarantining healthcare arrangements
involved. The Department of Health, utilising the services of the East Metropolitan
Health Service, has been working with Healthcare Australia throughout the
global pandemic experience to provide healthcare services to guests in our
hotels. That includes a team of nurses and doctors who essentially provide
primary care for all guests in the event that they need attention. Healthcare
Australia has been working throughout this period as part of that team.
As a result of the ongoing pressures
that we continue to experience in our hospitals and the demands in particular
in relation to the workforce, it was considered appropriate that we make sure
that all our nurses who are currently working as part of the East Metropolitan
Health Service team but in our hotel quarantine system should be redeployed back onto the front line, making sure that
we have as many people as p ossible involved in our health system. I stress
that this does not mean that we have outsourced the security, administration or
oversight of hotel quarantine; it is simply that healthcare component, which,
as I said, is primarily a primary healthcare function. The decision has been
made that we will take those nurses and put them back in our health system. It
has not been subject to advice from the Quarantine Advisory Panel. It is pretty
commonsense that we should make sure that as many of our doctors and nurses as
possible are made available to our health system and continue to provide good
wraparound services for hotel guests.
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