Infected nursing homes in Victoria kept secret from broader public

Almost 100 aged-care facilities and 25 home-care services in Victoria have had a positive case. But you won’t find out where every one is.

Australia’s top health authorities have refused to release a full list of the aged-care facilities infected with COVID-19 for fear of damaging the homes’ reputations, a parliamentary probe has heard.

Almost 100 aged-care facilities and 25 home-care services have had a positive coronavirus case in Victoria, according to government figures released on Tuesday.

At least 657 residents and 594 staff members have tested positive at nursing homes as well as 17 home-care recipients and 24 staff members.

Department of Health secretary Brendan Murphy told a parliamentary probe into the COVID-19 response in Canberra on Tuesday some facilities didn’t want it known publicly they had outbreaks.

“They’re obviously worried about reputational issues,” Mr Murphy said.

“Some of them have just had one staff member (test positive), and the facility’s been locked down, and it’s been controlled.”

When asked if a list of affected services would be made public, Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck said the government had stressed to facilities that families who had a loved one in their case should be advised.

“I’m reluctant to have a public hit list of facilities that have been unfortunate enough to have an outbreak of COVID,” he said.

“As long as the families know what’s going on and we’re ensuring that that’s the case.

“I am concerned about the stress that’s placed on facilities.”

Senator Colbeck said smaller facilities would not have the capacity to deal with a huge influx of media inquiries.

But Australian Greens Senator Rachel Siewert said “the public have a right to know”.

Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck doesn't want a public ‘hit list’ of facilities. Picture Gary Ramage

More than 250 older Australians have been evacuated from facilities across the state.

The parliamentary inquiry was told the only way to stop the virus getting into aged-care facilities was to stop community transmission.

However, in an alarming new development, authorities said they were not told about the deadly outbreak at St Basil’s aged-care facility in Fawkner for days – despite protocol requiring the commission be informed within half an hour.

Senator Colbeck said things “didn’t go as well as we would have liked” at the facility.

Staff shortages were a key issue for the home operated by the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, which had residents whose first language was not English.

However, it was revealed that worse-case planning scenarios did not include a whole workforce being infected.

“There isn’t really evidence that we’ve seen at this point in time that every single staff member, both career workforce and administration, has been determined to be a close contact,” Senator Colbeck said.

More than 2000 healthcare and aged-care staff are now in isolation or quarantine in Victoria.

Investigations into outbreaks at Newmarch House and Dorothy Henderson Lodge in NSW have highlighted that communication with families and strong facility management were important issues.

Senator Colbeck dismissed claims the workforce issues could have been predicted after the Earle Haven Retirement Village scandal – when the Queensland facility was suddenly closed due to a pay dispute, leaving residents without care.

Professor Brendan Murphy said ‘no country, no city with that sort of outbreak has been able to avoid substantial aged care infections and deaths’. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Gary Ramage

Aged care quality and safety commissioner Janet Anderson said 10 facilities in Victoria with outbreaks had been slapped with noncompliance notices since May.

Ms Anderson said a lack of clarity between corporate centres and on-site management about responsibilities could put residents at risk.

“We had evidence available to us that the response to the outbreak was slower than desirable, less decisive, and left the residents of that service at increased risk of harm,” she said.

Prof Murphy said there was no evidence that government-run aged-care facilities had better prevented COVID-19 outbreaks compared with the private and charitable sector.

“The main reason for (the lower cases) is that government facilities are largely outside of Melbourne where the risk of transmission is low,” he said.