Helensvale nurse Brooke Norton's repatriation duties continue during the COVID crisis despite the risks

Meet the Gold Coast nurse who continues to fly across the globe despite COVID lockdowns. READ HER INCREDIBLE STORY

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FLYING across the globe during a global pandemic to retrieve or return critically-ill or acutely injured patients is as complicated as it sounds, says emergency nurse Brooke Norton.

Ms Norton owns Southern Cross Assist, a business that repatriates Australians with medical issues home from overseas, something she and her team have continued to do throughout COVID crisis.

Just one of a handful of aeronautical nurses in Queensland, she’s recently completed a few outbound flights in order to get international citizens that were injured or unwell in Australia back home.

While the rest of the world was in lockdown, Ms Norton had an exemption to fly to London to retrieve a Gold Coaster, upon her return Queensland Health allowed her to isolate in her home.

Emergency nurse Brooke Norton at her home in Helensvale. Picture: Tertius Pickard

“We’ve also had to turn down some cases, which is always heartbreaking, because logistically they were impossible with flights not connecting, requiring a stopover in a country where we’d have to quarantine for 14 days,” she said.

Most of her work is sourced through travel insurance companies but she also got calls from loved ones without travel insurance. Her last flight was taking a UK citizen home from Melbourne, she was 62 and had had a stroke.

“One of our nurses brought a 92-year-old lady home from Germany who had tripped over and fractured her pelvis two months before. She had been in hospital so long that she was deconditioned, needing full nursing care to return home,” she said.

“Our staff couldn’t enter Germany without isolating so we had to ensure we had the inbound flight and outbound lined up perfectly so our team did not have to go through customs.

Emergency nurse Brooke Norton at her home in Helensvale. Picture: Tertius Pickard

“We had to cross all our fingers and toes that the flight coming into Germany was not delayed, and hope that the ambulance was in deed waiting at the airport for our team to take over care.”

Ms Norton, a casual at Gold Coast Private Hospital, said she enjoyed being the “final piece of the puzzle” to help someone desperate to get home do so.

“It’s a different type of nursing doing this as you can spend 30 hours with one patient so you really get to know them. There’s nothing more satisfying then seeing our patients return home to their loved ones and listening to their stories along the way.”

The Helensvale local is in the running to win a holiday worth $9000 after being nominated as a ‘local hero’ in travel brand Trafalgar’s initiative to shine a spotlight on “extraordinary individuals in communities around the country that have gone above and beyond” during 2020.

Nominations close December 11 and can be made at trafalgar.com/local-heroes. 

Emergency nurse Brooke Norton at her home in Helensvale. Picture: Tertius Pickard

BILL PASSED TO GET CITIZENS HOMES - Oct 9

GOLD Coasters stranded overseas have a glimmer of hope after a Labor bill passed in the Senate, calling on the Morrison Government to take “urgent steps’’ to get every citizen home.

Labor senators Penny Wong and Kristina Keneally were behind the motion that was narrowly passed in the Senate on Tuesday evening, with 28 for and 26 against.

According to the bill, Australia is the “only country to have actively restricted its citizens returning”, and it called on the Government to use its resources to increase quarantine capacity and take urgent steps to bring Australians home.

Sally and Graeme Wood are trying to get their daughter Emma back from Spain who is stranded due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Picture: Glenn Hampson

This would include considering charter flights.

It also wanted the Government to take steps to stop “price gouging by airlines flying into Australia”.

On Twitter, Senator Keneally said there were almost 30,000 Aussies wanting to return home and she accused Prime Minister Scot Morrison of “washing his hands of all responsibility”. The bill will now be heard in the lower house of Parliament.

Currently there is a 6000-person cap per week on people arriving from overseas, with Queensland accepting 1000 passengers a week.

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Senator Kristina Keneally. Picture Kym Smith

However, it is understood airlines are overbooking flights in anticipation of caps being lifted further and then cancelling flights at the last minute, and that preference is given to people who can afford business class seats.

The Bulletin has spoken to nearly a dozen Gold Coasters who have been trying to get home for months after their flights were cancelled. Their visas have expired, they are broke and most are couch surfing with friends.

Earlier this week Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton said the Government would “bring those Australians back today if there was room available in those hotels (in various states and territories)”.

“But the premiers have made a decision to cap those numbers (on return travellers) which means we need to bring people back in a slower fashion than what we would want,” he said.

Previously a Queensland Government spokesperson said: “Unsurprisingly, there is far less appropriate accommodation available in Brisbane compared to other major cities like Sydney.

“The repatriation of Australian citizens from overseas is the responsibility of the Commonwealth Government.”

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