Editorial: Time for a permanent solution to COVID-19 quarantine

Queensland and Australia have been living with COVID-19 for over a year, and it is well past time for a better than bandaid solution to quarantining, writes the editor.

Our hotel quarantine system has served us well so far but it was always a temporary solution in a crisis, not a perfect one.

The public backlash to suggestions fines or even jail could be handed out to Australians caught sneaking into their own country from India should serve as a wake-up call for the Federal Government that we need a better solution.

Denying citizens the right to return home from a dangerous environment under the threat of severe penalties is a measure usually reserved for terrorists who leave home to fight for extremists.

While the government is right to do everything it can to protect us from a third wave outbreak at home, it also has a duty to its citizens abroad.

The coronavirus pandemic is scary and unprecedented so of course our public officials will make missteps. And because it is scary, the tendency to overreact is understandable.

Interestingly, Federal MPs have in the past been the first to criticise states for overreacting in the heat of the moment. Now they have been caught out doing the same.

The Federal Government is trying to cover its tracks by blaming the media for reporting information contained in its own press release about the potential for $66,000 fines and up to five years jail time.

Rather than trying to deflect blame from themselves, the Morrison government’s energies would be better spent finding a superior solution to hotel quarantine. Using the NT’s Howard Springs camp to repatriate the estimated 9000 Australians stuck in India is a good idea.

But why has it taken a crisis the scale of that facing our northern neighbours for the federal government to finally warm up to regional quarantine camps?

The Howard Springs camp proved itself to be a good solution at the start of the pandemic.

And the states, including Queensland, have been pushing the Federal Government for an alternative to hotel quarantine for months, amid repeated incidents of the virus leaking out into cities across the nation.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has been advocating for a camp run by the Wagner family near Toowoomba but the proposal has been repeatedly rebuffed by the Federal Government.

But like Ms Palaszczuk said in January, a national quarantine plan deserves consideration. Dealing with overseas arrivals during the pandemic was a responsibility and expense that never should have fallen to the states.

The federal government is primarily responsible for setting limits on how many international arrivals can fly into the country, striking agreements with the states over the course of the pandemic.

Queensland was yesterday forced to bring in restrictions on visitors arriving from NSW in response to yet another hotel quarantine leak down south.

We cannot expect our hotels to be biohazard control facilities. They were not set up for this

The hotel quarantine model was the best available solution in the early days of an unprecedented global crisis and, so far as band-aids go, it has served us well.

But we have been living with COVID-19 for over a year now, refining containment strategies as we go along.

It is past time further thought was given at a national level to a more appropriate quarantine solution.

TIME OUR MOST PRECIOUS GIFT

The coronavirus pandemic has given a lot of us pause to consider what really matters and how we want to spend our time.

With many of the things we took for granted now routinely put on hold by lockdowns, quarantine and border restrictions, we are more than ever acutely aware of how precious good health and time with family and friends really is.

This Mother’s Day, it looks likely Queenslanders will be able to safely gather in groups to celebrate our mums, who in this edition reveal their version of an ideal day. What a gift this is.

Our thoughts are with other nations who will not be so lucky.

Responsibility for election comment is taken by Chris Jones, corner of Mayne Rd & Campbell St, Bowen Hills, Qld 4006. Printed and published by NEWSQUEENSLAND (ACN 009 661 778). Contact details are available here