Coronavirus NSW live updates: ADF deployed to find cruise cases
A NSW man who contracted COVID-19 onboard the Ruby Princess which docked in Sydney last week says he was waved through customs without health checks. A team of Defence Force personnel has been deployed to help NSW health authorities track down other passengers from the infected ship. LIVE UPDATES
A Tamworth man who contracted coronavirus onboard the Ruby Princess says he was waved through customs with no health checks after returning to Sydney on the infectious cruise ship.
Greg Butler, 56, arrived back in Sydney on Thursday and said authorities waved passengers through security without taking their temperature.
“They didn’t check bags, they didn’t check passports… We could have brought a bag of heroin in and walked straight through with it,” he said.
Mr Butler said he travelled home on public transport and was notified the next day of the confirmed cases onboard before starting to feel symptoms himself - a bad headache, cough and "pins and needles."
“They’ve just let nearly 3000 people into the city, god knows how many people had the virus.”
Meanwhile, ADF personnel have been deployed in "Contract Tracing Support Teams" to help NSW Health officials track down Ruby Princess passengers.
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Updates
LIVE quotes from deputy chief medical officer Paul Kelly
Billy Freeman
Workers at schools, preschools and TAFE colleges have been thrust into the frontline of the coronavirus crisis with not enough regard for their health and safety, teachers groups say.
Ahead of a meeting with Education Minister Dan Tehan and Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy tomorrow, Australian Education Union Federal President Correna Haythorpe called for all Australian governments to have consistency in decisions being made for the education sector.
“Our members are entitled to a safe workplace,” she said.
Teachers 'sacrificial lambs' in coronavirus debate
Workers at schools, preschools and TAFE colleges have been thrust into the frontline of the coronavirus crisis with not enough regard for their health and safety, teachers groups say.
Ahead of a meeting with Education Minister Dan Tehan and Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy tomorrow, Australian Education Union Federal President Correna Haythorpe called for all Australian governments to have consistency in decisions being made for the education sector.
“Our members are entitled to a safe workplace,” she said.
Bankstown Sports, one of the biggest clubs in NSW and Australia, has laid off more than 600 staff as the forced closure of clubs and pubs due to the coronavirus outbreak takes its toll on the local economy.
The club CEO Mark Condi confirmed they were forced to stand down 650 staff across six venues on Monday.
“The staff are devastated with many being there for more than 40 years,” a gutted Mr Condi told The Express.
Kmart in Bankstown has come up with a way to maintain social distancing in busy queues, using tape to mark appropriate distances for customers.
An X marks the spot where customers can stand to wait for checkout.
Sydney's museums and galleries shut
Jessica McSweeney
All of Sydney's major museums and galleries have now closed their doors until further notice, following a string of announcements today.
Eager to reassure audiences that they will still have access to art and culture, all the museums announced that they will migrate their offerings to the online realm.
The Art Gallery of NSW announced today that it will close because of the coronavirus. The gallery will delay the famous Archibald Prize for portraiture until later in the year. It was due to open on May 9.
The MCA (Museum of Contemporary Art Australia) also closed its doors today. The Powerhouse Museum and Sydney Observatory are shut. (The Australian Museum was already closed for building works ahead of next year's planned Tutankhamun exhibition.)
The Biennale of Sydney, which opened on March 14 for a scheduled three-month run, announced it would close its exhibitions across six sites in the city, including Cockatoo Island and the National Art School.
In Canberra, the National Gallery of Australia shut today because of the coronavirus threat. It is the second time the NGA has been hit by disaster this year. It closed its doors on and off during the bushfires, in order to protect the art on its walls.
-Elizabeth Fortescue
I do not care about coronavirus, says busted man
Billy Freeman
Some of the nation’s top doctors have warned they are “terrified” about the coronavirus pandemic and are pleading with Prime Minister Scott Morrison to enforce a nation-wide lock down before it is too late.
A video uploaded on Sunday night, not long after NSW and Victoria shut down non-essential businesses, shows some of the top medical professionals from across the country rallying together and urging the Federal Government that only more drastic action will save thousands of lives.
“I am terrified that the increasing number of cases are going to overwhelm our hospitals and we are going to make terrible triage decisions and we are not going to get the care we need,” Sydney neurologist Dr Kate Ahmad said.
Read the story via Anton Rose and see the video here.
Top doctors call for shutdown in video message
Some of the nation’s top doctors have warned they are “terrified” about the coronavirus pandemic and are pleading with Prime Minister Scott Morrison to enforce a nation-wide lock down before it is too late.
A video uploaded on Sunday night, not long after NSW and Victoria shut down non-essential businesses, shows some of the top medical professionals from across the country rallying together and urging the Federal Government that only more drastic action will save thousands of lives.
“I am terrified that the increasing number of cases are going to overwhelm our hospitals and we are going to make terrible triage decisions and we are not going to get the care we need,” Sydney neurologist Dr Kate Ahmad said.
Read the story via Anton Rose and see the video here.
Pool workers get coronavirus
Billy Freeman
Health chiefs have rejected calls for the old Mona Vale Hospital to be refitted and its new buildings used to treat and quarantine the expected onslaught of coronavirus cases.
Northern beaches family doctors believe there are insufficient intensive care beds to deal with a worst-case scenario.
Two hospitals in Adelaide are being reopened – Wakefield Hospital in the CBD and the ECH College Grove – and overseas, hospitals are recommissioned, emergency hospitals built and California has requested two mobile field hospitals.
But on Sunday, local Pittwater MP Rob Stokes, who has told a Newport GP that he had discussed with cabinet colleagues reusing Mona Vale, referred The Daily Telegraph to Health Minister Brad Hazard’s office who referred the matter to NSW Health.
In an email to concerned Newport GP Dr Suzanne Daly, Mr Stokes said on Sunday that he had suggested that Mona Vale Hospital’s new buildings – including a rehabilitation unit with 26 inpatient beds and an upgraded 24/7 urgent care centre – could be ‘ideal for extra ICU capacity’.
‘I agree with your concerns..I am unsure whether the old building has appropriate filtration systems or infection control systems but have certainly suggested it in my conversations with cabinet colleagues,’ the Planning Minister said in an email obtained by The Daily Telegraph.
Dr Daly, who is a supporter of maintaining Mona Vale Hospital and ran as a candidate in last year’s state elections for the Pittwater seat, had told Mr Stokes in an email that: ‘As a matter or urgency in the face of a pandemic….as a doctor of 40+ years, I had it ingrained in me that you have to cover the worst case scenario.’
She said that Mona Vale Hospital was needed ‘if there is any hope of preventing deaths’ because of the big demographic of people aged over 60 in the northern beaches.
‘There are insufficient ICU beds to cope. I put you and your government on notice,’ Dr Daly wrote to Mr Stokes.
Mona Vale Hospital closed in October 2018 when the new trouble-plagued Northern Beaches Hospital opened. It has been drafted in as a COVID-19 testing centre.
A Northern Sydney Local Health District spokesman said today that there were currently no plans to reinstate an ICU at Mona Vale Hospital.
‘As the COVID-19 situation develops the district will consider all measures necessary to manage demand on our services,’ a spokesman said.
-Janet Fife Yeomans
Calls to turn Mona Vale Hospital into coronavirus hub rejected
Health chiefs have rejected calls for the old Mona Vale Hospital to be refitted and its new buildings used to treat and quarantine the expected onslaught of coronavirus cases.
Northern beaches family doctors believe there are insufficient intensive care beds to deal with a worst-case scenario.
Two hospitals in Adelaide are being reopened – Wakefield Hospital in the CBD and the ECH College Grove – and overseas, hospitals are recommissioned, emergency hospitals built and California has requested two mobile field hospitals.
But on Sunday, local Pittwater MP Rob Stokes, who has told a Newport GP that he had discussed with cabinet colleagues reusing Mona Vale, referred The Daily Telegraph to Health Minister Brad Hazard’s office who referred the matter to NSW Health.
In an email to concerned Newport GP Dr Suzanne Daly, Mr Stokes said on Sunday that he had suggested that Mona Vale Hospital’s new buildings – including a rehabilitation unit with 26 inpatient beds and an upgraded 24/7 urgent care centre – could be ‘ideal for extra ICU capacity’.
‘I agree with your concerns..I am unsure whether the old building has appropriate filtration systems or infection control systems but have certainly suggested it in my conversations with cabinet colleagues,’ the Planning Minister said in an email obtained by The Daily Telegraph.
Dr Daly, who is a supporter of maintaining Mona Vale Hospital and ran as a candidate in last year’s state elections for the Pittwater seat, had told Mr Stokes in an email that: ‘As a matter or urgency in the face of a pandemic….as a doctor of 40+ years, I had it ingrained in me that you have to cover the worst case scenario.’
She said that Mona Vale Hospital was needed ‘if there is any hope of preventing deaths’ because of the big demographic of people aged over 60 in the northern beaches.
‘There are insufficient ICU beds to cope. I put you and your government on notice,’ Dr Daly wrote to Mr Stokes.
Mona Vale Hospital closed in October 2018 when the new trouble-plagued Northern Beaches Hospital opened. It has been drafted in as a COVID-19 testing centre.
A Northern Sydney Local Health District spokesman said today that there were currently no plans to reinstate an ICU at Mona Vale Hospital.
‘As the COVID-19 situation develops the district will consider all measures necessary to manage demand on our services,’ a spokesman said.
-Janet Fife Yeomans
Georgia Clark
A TAMWORTH man who contracted coronavirus onboard the Ruby Princess says he was waived through customs with no health checks, after returning to Sydney on the infectious cruise ship.
Greg Butler, 56, left on the Ruby Princess cruise with his partner on March 8. The ship returned to Sydney last Thursday. Mr Butler said authorities waved passengers through security, and did not conduct any temperature checks.
“There was no health checks, nothing,” he said.
“They didn’t check bags, they didn’t check passports… We could have brought a bag of heroin in and walked straight through with it.”
Mr Butler said he was notified the next day that people from the ship had tested positive for the killer disease. He started to feel symptoms on Friday, a day after leaving the cruise ship, and travelling on public transport to get home.
“We thought they shouldn’t have let us off the boat for a start, and especially to just jump on public transport and head home, (we) could have come into contact with anyone,” he said.
“They’ve just let nearly 3000 people into the city, god knows how many people had the virus.”
The 56 year old said he has a bad headache, a cough, and is experiencing “pins and needles.”
“I feel alright, just a little bit tired,” he said.
