Health workers lead as we celebrate our frontline heroes
Despite the stress and ever-present risk of infection from COVID-19, health workers are continuing to put themselves on the line every day to defend a grateful nation. The Herald Sun salutes these frontline heroes.
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Not all heroes wear capes. Our frontline health worker heroes wear nursing scrubs, protective lab gear and white coats.
Those health workers are both our primary means of defence and attack against the virus, which is why the Herald Sun celebrates them today in the first of our Frontline Heroes special features.
Their work continues despite the ever-present risk that they may also become infected.
Despite that stress, these brilliant people put themselves on the line every day to defend a grateful nation.
And they are supported not just by abundant Australian goodwill. Throughout the land, frontline hero armies are mobilised and active.
They all deserve special notice for devotion above and beyond the call of duty. They also deserve our support in keeping them as safe as possible as they carry out their crucial work.
That’s why we will also campaign for them to receive all the protective equipment they need — clothing, gloves, masks and anything else needed to minimise risks.
In coming days, the Herald Sun will salute our police and members of the Australian military, whose daily deployment puts them in direct confrontation with potential infection scenarios.
We will hail the firefighters who endured a summer from hell and who still safeguard our properties.
We will cheer supermarket checkout staff who encounter hundreds of customers every day and keep serving and smiling throughout.
And we will commend the storeroom packers and delivery people who are keeping our households running.
These are our Frontline Heroes. They are great Australians, every last one of them.
Sam Weir — Herald Sun editor
HOW GPS ARE COPING
Dr Billy Stoupas, GP, Hughesdale
These are unprecedented times and somewhat chaotic working in this environment because so many things are changing from day to day.
We have set up a gazebo in the car park for a clinic outside. We can set up a line with distance between people or have them sit in their cars until we call them.
We call all of our patients before they come in and give them coronavirus screening questions but numbers are interesting. A lot of people think GPs must be inundated with coronavirus — we are quite the opposite. Some clinics are dropping 30 per cent in patient numbers, some have lost 50 per cent as people are scared to go to the doctor.
We are performing wipe-downs every hour of the entire facility — door handles, chairs, computer keyboards, everything. It is safer coming here than it is going to a supermarket.
We have to keep ourselves healthy and well so that we can continue seeing patients.
The federal government has gone a long way to help by introducing telehealth so we don’t need to see patients face-to-face but sometimes in-person consults are invaluable, so it’s something we are still trying to offer where we can.
The limiting factor is the supply of personal protective equipment. Glove supplies are OK, gowns are not too bad, but masks are an obvious problem. We can never have enough masks so we’re having to try and make the ones we do have last longer.
We are disinfecting P2 masks at the end of the day so we can re-use them.
In the past we have been a mixed billing clinic, which means that some people pay out of pocket but in this difficult challenges we have decided that we will bulk bill everybody at least the next three months.
HOSPITALS BRACING FOR IMPACT
Karlee Robson, infectious diseases nurse, Royal Melbourne Hospital
Right now it feels like the calm before the storm.
A lot of people here compare it to Game of Thrones saying “winter is coming”.
That really is how it feels. We are waiting and we know it is going to come, we know it will hit us very soon and we are just bracing ourselves.
But, so far, it has gone quite well.
To date we have had quite a few coronavirus patients and suspected patients, and we have been taking it as it comes.
Today, we (the infectious disease ward) are preparing to become the hospital’s dedicated coronavirus ward.
We have a plan and yes, we will be taking all the COVID-19 patients — this is what we do.
It has been quite busy at times and we are all definitely working very hard, but we do feel prepared because being the infectious disease ward we are already very familiar with the personal protective equipment.
We have worked with similar things and we have trained for a ebola.
Here on the infectious disease ward we are very comfortable with this situation, so it has been less of a shock to us than for other areas that have not seen anything like this before.
There are about 40 people in our team, though some are graduates or part time. We are all stepping up and talking on extra.
I am very proud of myself and all the other staff here.
But it is daunting.
When you hear about what is coming and that hospitals are likely to be inundated with these cases — then you hear the statistics about how many healthcare workers overseas have got coronavirus — that is all very daunting.
My family are very worried and I have had to reassure them.
But, in the end it is the PPE that will protect us as long as we are doing that safely and being conscious of safety.
What we really need is for everybody else to protect us by staying at home because we are the ones who still have to be out and about.
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