Scott Morrison’s corona-cynicism is the real health threat
Still bruised by his failure over the bushfire disaster, the PM can suddenly prove he doesn’t make the same mistake twice. But is coronavirus just the Y2K bug of our times, asks Claire Harvey.
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Whenever there is a threat from outside our borders, the Government is winning.
A few years ago it was boats. Now it’s coronavirus.
Despite the fact your risk of dying from this illness is tiny, Scott Morrison would like you to now commence being very, very concerned not just about random sneezers on the train, but also about Anthony Albanese’s shocking lack of concern about this grave health risk.
I may regret saying this when I’m in a plastic tent at St Vincent’s, but could it be possible that coronavirus is the Y2K bug of our times?
All Australia’s leading doctors – and the World Health Organisation – have spent weeks saying there is no need to wear a face mask, no need to avoid yum cha, no need to cancel your holiday, and that the best thing you can do to avoid coronavirus is to wash your hands before touching your face.
But on Thursday, apparently seized with a new sense of urgency, the Prime Minister held an urgent-seeming press conference to talk about tighter border controls, fever checks at airports, aged care lockdowns and stockpiling medicines.
That’s an interesting one, given that the medical experts say there is actually no treatment for coronavirus, and in fact all doctors can do is ease the fever and flu-like symptoms it causes, and provide fluids.
Antibiotics don’t work on viruses. The risk with coronavirus and all similar cold-related bugs is that they develop into bacterial pneumonia at which point they can kill people who are already frail, elderly or otherwise vulnerable, such as immune-compromised cancer patients.
And that’s the big point, for me.
We already have influenza at pandemic levels every winter. And yet we can’t even get ourselves organised to ensure all doctors and nurses get the flu vaccine.
We’ve got children dying of meningococcal B, for which we have a perfectly good vaccine available, and the bureaucrats in charge of funding vaccines won’t put it on the free public vaccine schedule because it’s too expensive.
But for a PM bruised by his own failure to anticipate, prepare for or cope with the bushfire disaster, coronavirus is a chance to prove he doesn’t make the same mistake twice.
If coronavirus does hit us hard this winter, and cause many people to feel rotten and flood emergency departments for IV fluids and pain relief, our hospitals may well be overwhelmed.
But that will be because hospitals are already jam-packed every winter with influenza patients.
Why?
Because too many of us don’t bother to get vaccinated or don’t bother with basic hygiene like handwashing.
Flu is already a pandemic, morphing from year to year with the same consequence: vast expense and enormous suffering.
It’s our greatest cause of vaccine-preventable illness and death.
If the PM and Mr Hunt want to ensure our health system can cope with any future pandemic – like coronavirus – here is my suggestion: make the flu vaccine a requirement to work, volunteer or visit in the health system, from aged care to hospices, hospitals and general practices. The problem would be vastly diminished almost instantly.
Then we can all focus on the panicking.