Jeannette Young under attack: Trolls told to ‘back off’
The state’s peak medical body has mounted a vigorous defence of Queensland’s Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young, fronting a press conference to warn “online trolls” and bullies to “back off”.
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The state’s peak medical body has mounted a vigorous defence of Queensland’s Chief Health Officer Jeannette Young, fronting a press conference to warn “online trolls” and bullies to “back off”.
Australian Medical Association of Queensland president Dr Chris Perry fronted a media conference this morning alongside Health Minister Steven Miles to pledge support for the CHO after a wave of criticism about perceived double standards in the quarantine restrictions.
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It follows a torrid week for the Queensland Government, with Prime Minister Scott Morrison attacking Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk over her stance on the border.
It comes as the state recorded no new coronavirus cases overnight, with 30 active cases remaining.
That compares to 145 active cases in NSW and 41 new cases as well as seven deaths in Victoria.
Dr Perry fronted the media conference at Parliament House this morning to warn critics of Dr Young to “back off”, adding the body thinks she was “doing a good job”.
“All we can say is back off. We think this Chief Health Officer is doing a great job,” Dr Perry said.
“Leave her alone. We support what she is doing and we think people should back off and leave her alone.
“The AMA in Queensland, we have a very, very straightforward policy. We believe in the science of the Chief Health Officer. We believe that Queensland should follow the advice of the Chief Health Officer and if she says the border should stay closed, we think they should stay closed.
“I know she is under stress. Queensland Health has given her more support in staff to take the pressure off.”
When asked who was responsible for that stress, he replied: “mostly online trolls.”
“I know the Federal Government has a different point of view about borders.
“We don’t want to get into that. We follow what the Chief Health Officer says and we’ll leave it alone at that.
“It has mostly been the online people, the bullying which occurs on social media these days.
“I know the Chief Health Officer gets quite a bit of that.”
The AMAQ also responded to criticism about restrictions on grieving family members of deceased Queenslanders to attend the funeral.
“We would prefer to have fewer funerals than have more people at those funerals,” he said.
AMAQ vice-president Dr Bav Manoharan echoed the same sentiment at this morning’s press conference, saying: “I guess the question we want all Queenslanders to really ask themselves is: ‘Do we want more people at funerals, or do we want more COVID funerals?
“I think this is something we really need to be thinking about.
“As a health professional myself, Dr Perry all of our members, and Dr Jeannette Young, we’re inherently compassionate people. We have to be because of our oath. So we really need to say, what are we weighing up here. Are we weighing up the interests of the tourist industry and other industries, or are we looking at the health of Queenslanders.”
Health Minister Steven Miles referred to the number of active cases interstate to highlight the contrast in Queensland.
He said Victoria had reported seven deaths in 24 hours, which was “more deaths in one 24-hour period than Queensland has experienced throughout this entire pandemic.”
“A lot of people in Queensland might not feel like this pandemic is a real threat but if we hadn’t managed to keep those cases out, if we hadn’t managed to contain that second wave largely to Victoria, then we wouldn’t be able to go about the freedoms we have now,” he said.
“We certainly wouldn’t have our economy operating at the level it is now. We wouldn’t have businesses open and people in jobs as we do now.
“And so it is just so important that we continue to take the health advice.
“There has been a lot of commentary recently about who should make these kind of decisions.
“Whether it should be politicians or whether it should be advised by medical experts.”
