Top virus expert reveals cracks in our pandemic response

Australia has been warned its fight against Covid is falling behind — and may not be able to cope with a new pandemic surge.

Fractures in Australia’s Covid-19 research defences could leave the nation unable to cope with another pandemic surge, according to our foremost expert.

After leading the world with its initial response to the coronavirus pandemic during 2020, the head of the Doherty Institute, Sharon Lewin, said Australia’s preparedness was falling behind other areas of the world.

Professor Lewin was on Wednesday night honoured by the National Health and Medical Research Council for leading Australia’s preparations for the likelihood of a pandemic in recent years and for heading the fight when Covid-19 arrived.

She warned, however, that more work was needed to overcome state-based systems that limit the scientific advances needed to respond to any new wave of cases or future pandemics – at a time when other nations had reversed their flagging fortunes.

“In the first phase in early 2020, without a doubt, the science-informed policy, the trust in science and the trust in government was high. I think it was quite unique (in Australia),” Professor Lewin said.

Professors Ben Howden and Sharon Lewin at the Doherty Institute. Picture: Alex Coppel

“Having said that, in 2021 the US and the UK research response has been absolutely spectacular. Vaccines, new therapies, tracking the variants … In Australia we still need to be a bit better connected across the country, and with government, in how we deal with public health data.

“In 2021, I’ve seen that we have a lot of room to move. It is to our detriment in how we run research, in how we use the data from public health, how we interrogate the data, how we co-ordinate clinical trials across the country.

“Our public health response is state driven, it has fragmented the response, and I think we need to address that – 2020 was much more unified.”

On Wednesday night, Professor Lewin received the NHMRC’s biennial Outstanding Contribution Award for leading the Doherty’s research and tracking response to Covid-19, as well as communicating the scientific efforts to the community.

Those efforts began long before Covid-19, though, as Professor Lewin was appointed in 2016 as the chief investigator of APPRISE – the NHMRC-funded Australian Partnership for Preparedness Research on Infectious Disease Emergencies – bringing together experts to build a blueprint for how the nation would respond to a pandemic.

After swine flu exposed the dangers Australia was largely fortunate to avoid, NHMRC chief executive Anne Kelso said Professor Lewin was fundamental in uniting the best scientific minds as they responded to Covid-19.

“You don’t know when it (a pandemic) is going to happen, but we always knew it would, and it will happen again,” Professor Kelso said. “It is only the timing and the severity that is unknown.

“The great thing in Australia as a whole, across the board, is that people were just putting their hand up to do something useful.”

Prof Sharon Lewin received the NHMRC’s biennial Outstanding Contribution Award for leading the Doherty Institute’s research and tracking response to Covid-19. Picture: Ian Currie

While pre-emptive pandemic planning and funding had Australia “quick off the mark” in responding to coronavirus in January 2020, Professor Lewin said it now needed to follow the lessons of other nations by improving data sharing, tracking, research and vaccination efforts.

“If you look at what is happening in the UK, every week they are able to report what is happening with their variants on every level, across the country,” Professor Lewin said.

“We need to be sure we could do exactly the same if we were in that position. Luckily we are not, but I am not sure we have the level of co-ordination across the country strong enough for future preparedness and that is what we need to focus on in the coming year.

“We have some foundations, but it is not the whole gamut and that is largely because of our fragmented public health system, where it is state-led.

“We’ve had a bit of a warning with a trial run of what we need, but if we had really big numbers I’d be worried we just don’t have those systems in place yet.

“It was fine for last year but I am not sure going forward it’s strong enough.

“We need to address this as a country.”

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