Daughters’ desperate plea to Queensland Health to attend Eric Brown’s funeral

A Queensland mother is begging Queensland Health to grant an exemption for her daughters to attend their father’s funeral, and has made a radical offer to seal the deal.

Two heartbroken daughters are desperate to attend their father’s funeral on Monday, with their mother saying she will put them in hazmat suits if it means Queensland Health will grant them an exemption they applied for more than two weeks ago.

Charlotte, 20, and Sarah-Jane, 22, Brown applied for an exemption with Queensland Health the day after their father, Eric Brown, died from Lung Cancer on August 14.

State blame game after couple loses baby amid border row

Coronavirus Qld: Case update as restrictions toughen following cluster blow-out

On Wednesday, Queensland Health advised the girls that they must isolate for two weeks in a Brisbane hotel and would not be granted an exemption to leave isolation to attend their father’s funeral in Toowoomba.

Mum Catherine Brown told the Courier-Mail on Saturday she is desperate for Queensland Health to allow the girls to attend the funeral on Monday and self-isolate at their Toowoomba home.

“All I want is to let them come in and isolate here at home (in Toowoomba) and we will isolate with them, we will go to the funeral, come home and that’s it,” she said.

“Now there’s the new restriction of 10 people in the house so we’re not going to have a wake, we’re not going to have nothing. Go to the funeral and come home, that’s all I want, I just want them here.

Eric Brown died of lung cancer on August 14.

“I know that things have changed but we escalated this on Wednesday and they said they’d get back to us in 48 hours, it’s Saturday.”

Charlotte and Sarah-Jane both work for the Royal Australian Navy and are based in the ACT and Sydney respectively.

“I think they are going to try and drive to the border, they’ve got an exemption from the navy, they’ve been tested, they’ve had their temperature taken every day,” Mrs Brown said.

“But the police aren’t going to let them in without the exemption from Queensland Health, every time they say to me ‘we’re protecting Queenslanders’ I understand that, I have offered to put them in a hazmat suit. I will go down and get a hazmat suit for them so that they are completely isolated, we’ll all wear one, we will go to the funeral and come home.”

Mrs Brown said her daughters love their father very much and it’s important they say goodbye to him in person, not over Zoom.

A Queensland Health spokesperson said their thoughts are with those who have lost a loved one during this unprecedented time.

“We absolutely understand and sympathise that this is a very difficult time to navigate,” a spokesperson said.

“And we understand the health directions in place are strict, but they are designed to protect Queenslanders from COVID-19.

“Hotel quarantine in Queensland has strict controls and oversight to ensure the safety of those quarantining and the community as a whole.”

Eric Brown with his daughters Charlotte (left) and Sarah-Jane (right).