Andrews’ government warned about lack of hotel quarantine PPE in April
A Labor-linked company providing doctors for the hotel quarantine program warned the state government about a lack of PPE in April, it can be revealed.
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The Andrews Government was warned in April about a lack of protective clothing in quarantine hotels by the Labor-connected owners of a company awarded the $417,000 contract to provide doctors for the program.
The Medi7 group, co-owned by doctors Henry and Nathan Pinskier, was given the contract for medical services in hotel quarantine during its first month of operation.
The brothers are both long-time members of the ALP in which Dr Henry Pinksier served as vice-president in the 2000s.
Dr Nathan Pinskier wrote to Chief Health Officer Professor Brett Sutton on April 13 raising serious concerns about the lack of personal protective equipment at quarantine hotels, which will be key focus of the inquiry led by former judge Jennifer Coate.
That warning was sent to the department two days before the Australian Medical Association also raised the alarm on April 15 about serious infection control issues.
Earlier this month, Health Minister Jenny Mikakos told state parliament she was never informed of the problems raised by the AMA.
Questions from the Herald Sun about whether she was informed of Mr Pinskier’s letter were not answered.
A Department of Health and Human Services spokeperson said that Medi7 “directly arranges for medical practitioners to provide after-hours and weekend medical services to patients”.
“The company was identified as being able to access doctors and other medical professional quickly, as well as having good knowledge of available medical professionals located near the CBD hotels being used for quarantine program.”
The contract was signed off by the department under emergency procurement guidelines, which are brought into effect during critical incidents.
There was no preferred provider list for the services required.
The Pinskiers have run Medi7, which operates a number of GP clinics, for more than two decades.
Henry Pinskier’s daughter is an adviser in Premier Daniel Andrews’s office – but the Herald Sun was told that this would not have had a role in determining the contract because it was department process.
Dr Henry Pinskier said: “I have not discussed the arrangement with DHHS with anyone in the ALP.”
Some senior doctors have backed the company as able to fulfil the two-week contract, which included face-to-face consultations and telehealth conferences for returned travellers, but others said they had no specialty in infection control work.
Several extra doctors were brought in to assist as the scale of the task before health and security officials became obvious.
Medi7 made an urgent request for assistance to an IT company to help it keep track of records and medication, leading to a further contract being struck with BP Software.
Fifteen licences were provided for a software program that allowed the group to capture clinical notes electronically and keep data secure.
Senior medical sources said they were shocked there had been no provision in original the contract stipulating who would provide PPE or infection control procedures within the quarantine hotels.
One told the Herald Sun that Medi7 was among the top handful of companies equipped to undertake the medical services spelt out in the Government’s contracts, however.
“Notwithstanding their political connections, I think they would still be the top pick,” they said.
However, another medical source has raised concerns that Medi7 did not have specialist infection control capabilities and that a second contract should have been struck to bring in a company that did.
And according to further sources, other companies would have been available and suitable to do the work in the contract that was inked without a tender.
Australian Medical Association Victorian president Prof Julian Rait, who wrote to CHO Prof Brett Sutton on April 15 about problems in the hotel quarantine system, said he was confident Medi7 were the correct choice to provide medical services in the quarantine program.
But he said he had concerns about government departments failing to adequately support its doctors with resources or additional infection control process as the program ramped up.
“The Medi7 group is a very highly regarded group of medical deputising services and they would have been a not inappropriate choice,” Prof Rait said.
“But I think that there was an immediate understanding that the scale of what was required was not covered off in the first instance.”
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