The Doomsayers: Meet the health experts making Covid predictions

These people are the ones predicting the most miserable outcomes of the pandemic - and that is the way they like it. Find out all about The Doomsayers.

They’re the prophets of doom and the bringers of gloom. From the start of the pandemic their predictions and punditry have been used to turn a once in a lifetime event into the never-ending story. Welcome to the first instalment of our series … The Doomsayers.

The ABC's Dr Norman Swan, one of the leading doomsayers. Picture: Janie Barrett

Norman Swan: Previously best known as the official doctor on weight loss show The Biggest Loser, Dr Norman Swan is the paediatrician turned pundit who since the start of the pandemic has set himself up as an unofficial opposition health spokesman on the ABC. Dr Swan is most notable for predicting, back in March of last year that we would soon be seeing 70,000-80,000 cases per day, and that we were “14-20 days behind” hard-hit Italy. More recently, Dr Swan demanded all of Sydney be put in a hard lockdown just before Christmas to respond to the Northern Beaches cluster … which was well localised and resulted in just 151 cases.

1700 on Monday, 3400 on Wednesday or Thursday, 7-8000 by next weekend. True number by then 70-80,000 possibly. Primary school maths. Someone should go figure. No magic fairy will bring that down. 14-20 days behind Italy. Believe in maths not magic. https://t.co/wDysEg13CW

— Norman Swan (@normanswan) March 21, 2020

Bill Bowtell: Ex-Keating government adviser Bill Bowtell opened the pandemic by berating Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck on ABC’s Q&A, repeatedly calling the government’s response “rubbish”, but the political science student turned medical expert is a regular critic of Coalition responses. Most famous for his “Grim Reaper” ads to raise AIDS awareness (which asserted that “if not stopped it could kill more Australians than World War II”), he suddenly became allergic to scare campaigns when the government rolled out its own campaign showing a woman gasping for breath and suffering from Covid. “That is an ad with an actor pretending to have Covid … it’s not honest or truthful or authentic,” he said. He also claimed last year the Swedish response to the pandemic was a “fiasco”. The Scandinavian country is currently 39th in the world for Covid fatalities.

Ex-Labor minister Professor Bill Bowtell has flipflopped on scare campaigns. Picture: AAP Image/Lukas Coch

Jeannette Young: While every state’s health officials have made their blunders – South Australia’s Nicola Spurrier telling footy fans to avoid a potentially infections football kicked by Collingwood players – but Queensland’s Jeannette Young takes the cake. Dr Young, who once banned an Anzac Day vintage warbirds flyover because of social distancing, has more recently been accused of encouraging vaccine hesitancy by saying that under-40s should not take the AstraZeneca jab. This despite rising cases, a need to vaccinate the country to meet reopening targets, and a major study of 1.3 million Spaniards suggesting that AstraZeneca has “a similar safety profile” to Pfizer.

Queensland Chief Medical Officer Jeanette Young recently said those under 40 should not get AstraZeneca. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Sarah Marshall

Professor Raina McIntyre: Sydneysiders with long memories might remember infectious diseases specialist Raina McIntyre from the last pandemic, the swine flu that hit the country in 2009. That disease took 191 lives in Australia but in July of that year Prof. McIntyre told ABC Radio that “we could be looking at anything in the ballpark of…10,000 to 20,000 deaths”. Fast forward to the current pandemic, and Prof. McIntyre was one of the first to suggest that “hundreds of thousands” could die here. Lately she has been a go-to expert for anyone wanting to back in tougher lockdowns and restrictions – she was among the cheerleaders for tough city-wide restrictions ahead of Christmas, and also advised Sydneysiders to have a “socially distanced Mother’s Day”.

No Mother’s Day mingling for Professor Raina MacIntyre. Picture: UNSW

Be careful about catching a footy ball around South Australia’s Chief Public Health Officer Professor Nicola Spurrier. Picture: NCA NewsWire / David Mariuz

Nicola Spurrier: She may have said she was kidding about avoiding the potentially infected Collingwood football, but South Australia’s chief health supremo has made South Australia one of the weirdest jurisdictions in the country. South Australia has locked people into their homes at the tiniest indication of a cluster, and recently in response to outbreaks in other states decided to ban stand-up drinking. Because you can never be too careful. Or as she said after a snap lockdown that took place last year after it was briefly thought a particularly virulent variant was spreading via pizza deliveries, “you can never be too careful”.

Originally published as The Doomsayers: Meet the health experts making Covid predictions