James Campbell: Covid probe confirms fears over Dan’s new job

The Covid inquiry makes it clear why it was always going to be problematic appointing Daniel Andrews to chair a charity devoted to the mental health of young people.

The release of the final report of the federal government’s Covid inquiry should make it clear why – even without the intervention of Jeff Kennett – it was always going to be problematic appointing Daniel Andrews to chair a charity devoted to the mental health of young people.

As anyone who had children during that traumatic period already knew, the inquiry has found governments’ “focus on the health impacts for the broader population. meant that the indirect impacts of response measures on children and young people were not prioritised.”

Experts who spoke to the report’s authors also said the “pandemic response measures did not take a holistic view of health and wellbeing, and came at the expense of considering the unique needs of children and young people or their ‘education, emotional, cognitive and physical development.”

Without naming the Victorian government it also singled out Spring Street’s decision to close playgrounds as well as the more widely applied school closures as having been implemented “despite evidence of limited transmission risk.”

After Covid, it was always going to be problematic appointing Dan Andrews to chair a youth mental health organisation. Picture: Luis Enrique Ascui

The report makes clear the youngsters’ mental health and wellbeing were significantly impacted by the pandemic which occurred at a time when children’s mental health was already seen to be in crisis.

It found: “Increased social isolation, stress, anxiety, uncertainty, loss of control, disruption to daily routines and concerns for the wellbeing of family and loved ones” either caused problems or exacerbated those which already existed.

“School closures and remote learning also led to increased engagement with social media, triggering weight and bodychecking behaviours among some young people,” it found.

Research has found that “lifestyle disruptions during lockdowns caused changes in brain biology in children and young people, with a greater impact on the adolescent female brain than the adolescent male brain.”

It goes without saying of course that hindsight is a wonderful thing.

If we were to have our time again – it is to be hoped – that we wouldn’t make the same mistakes.

Moreover to what extent these mistakes can be sheeted home to Daniel Andrews himself is something for historians to debate.

What is clear however is that a substantial slice of the population are still angry at the former premier for decisions he took in that crisis and there is nothing at the present time that will change that.

Which is why, despite his long time interest in mental health, he was a bizarre choice to chair Orygen.

Maybe not in a few years when emotions have cooled, but certainly now.

James Campbell is a Herald Sun columnist