Health Minister Brad Hazzard warns social distancing fact of life
Australians may have to get used to social distancing being a fact of life, NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard says as he shares his fears in an exclusive interview with The Sunday Telegraph that an effective COVID-19 vaccine may never be found.
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NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard fears we may never find an effective vaccine for coronavirus and social distancing may become a fact of life.
In an exclusive and emotional interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Mr Hazzard talked of his fears for a second wave of infections, how blaming China is futile, how he can’t blame anyone for the Ruby Princess fiasco and how close we came to a death toll like Italy.
With lockdowns easing, Mr Hazzard — an asthmatic who carries hand sanitiser with his inhaler — confessed to feeling uneasy, especially with no guarantee we will ever get a vaccine, despite President Donald trump’s promises to that effect.
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“Well, contrary to one international leader’s certainty that we’ll get it, I don’t share that certainty. We’ve never had a vaccine for a coronavirus,” he said.
“I think there is a realistic chance that we might not and for that reason we need to calmly go out making our lives … living our lives reasonably but sensibly and that means remembering that this virus is quite capable of going from one person to another and also having disaster consequences.
“I’m still hoping. In my life going back to my science days, I can’t remember a time when there was such as focus on one area by so many research teams across the world, so I think I have a view that we have the best chance of getting a vaccine, but is it actually going to happen? That’s another issue.”
This means while packed pub nights are obviously gone “for now”, there may always be a need for social distancing, which he concedes would forever change our “matey” way of life.
“Unless there is a vaccine or cure — a vaccine for prevention, a cure for once you’ve got it — this virus will be with us for a long while,” he said.
“I hope they come back, but it’s going to depend very much on the vaccine.”
Mr Hazzard, who described this year as “the most difficult period professionally” conceded the nation had “lockdown fatigue” but urged people not to become complacent.
“The virus is still out there and is still really dangerous,” he said.
“This is something that must change our lives.”
As for blaming China for not raising the alarm earlier, the veteran Liberal minister who once contemplated a career in medicine said, while he always doubted the early claims of there being no human-to-human transmission, finger-pointing at any one country was futile.
Mr Hazzard — nicknamed “Battleship” by former premier Mike Baird for tackling all that came his way — revealed how he and other senior health officials had broken down in tears at different times at the height of the outbreak in March, asking at the time: “Can we do this?”
And, while there have been disagreements among ministers over the lockdowns, Mr Hazzard said he accepted that restrictions needed to be eased.
The former North Sydney Boys High School science teacher said while Australia led the world in terms of case numbers, the virus was still “very much among us”.
“I am quite fearful,” he said.
“My biggest fear is that this virus will come back in great numbers. I understand that we have to free up — we must free up — some of the restrictions because, if we don’t, we also have an economic disaster.
“It’s Sophie’s Choice.”
It was towards the end of January, when much of the attention was still focused on bushfires, when senior health officials began holding daily meetings about how Australia would respond in the event of an outbreak.
There were already four cases in NSW — each having flown in from China — putting the state government on high alert.
While the early evidence coming out of Wuhan in December was that there was “no human to human transmission”, Mr Hazzard revealed his doubts at the time.
“I found that difficult to believe on the basis of the number of people that were coming down with it, so I was on high alert from that time,” he said.
“When it really clicked in was when we got our first case. That stepped it up. It was more than high alert, it was: This is coming.”
The advice from the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee (AHPPC) at the time was that children should not be stopped from going to school.
Mr Hazzard said he believed the decision by the state government to force parents who had returned from China to isolate their children at home for 14 days may have paved the way for the low case numbers in the state today.
“It was a massive pressure point,” he said.
“I remember agonising about whether it was logical at that point to have children returning from China, going in to our schools, when we knew nothing about the impact on children.”
As case numbers began to soar, with the bungled release of infected passengers aboard the Ruby Princess together with thousands of Australian travellers returning home from abroad, another pressure point emerged — hospital capacity and the urgent need for ventilators and personal protective equipment.
Mr Hazzard admitted that had been “a huge challenge”.
Premier Gladys Berejiklian told her “war cabinet” of her most senior ministers that the private sector should be asked to help manufacture vital supplies.
It was a decision made and executed within days and — along with keeping open older hospitals, rapid-training staff and boosting testing — Mr Hazzard said it helped prepare the state for what was to come.
“I think that probably has messages going forward as to how government needs to be when there is a crisis and, perhaps, in normal times,” he said.
While case numbers have plunged, Mr Hazzard can still name the exact date when he felt Australia was heading down the same pathway as Italy.
“When we had 212 new cases on the 27th March,” he said.
Health modelling at the time had been predicting “many, many deaths”, which on that day appeared likely.
The concept of herd immunity — letting as many healthy people become infected as possible — was considered and ditched, with little evidence it would work.
Mr Hazzard, who becomes upset when recalling that period, said many of the most senior public health officials, including Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant, spent the night in the office, preparing for what was to come.
On some nights, it was overwhelming.
“There have been times when everybody in health have felt a sense of: ‘Can we do this?’ I was awake most of the night. I was thinking: ‘This could all go terribly pear-shaped’,” Mr Hazzard said.
“Everybody at a senior level within health — everybody — has had tears at some point.”
Asked about the bungling of Ruby Princess, Mr Hazzard said the “same health officials” were behind the decisions that had put the state in the “best position” in the world, “so I will back the public health officials 100 per cent”.
As for the decision of cruise ships to set sail after a pandemic was declared, Mr Hazzard said he believed the industry had learned its lesson.
“The message for cruise companies is when there is a novel virus — and there may be another at some point — then perhaps they need to shut down their operations far faster,” he said.
Mr Hazzard, who describes nurses as “heaven-sent angels”, also sidestepped the upcoming wages war, which he says is a matter for Treasurer Dominic Perrottet, although he declared: “My personal view should probably stay that way”.
Ms Berejiklian praised Mr Hazzard for his stamina during the crisis, while also noting this “enormous compassion”.
“Brad has demonstrated enormous stamina and persistence during a crisis none of us could have imagined,” he said.