Doctors in the House push COVID-19 app

Medico MPs are urging Australians and sceptical colleagues to download a controversial coronavirus tracing app.

Barnaby Joyce refuses to download the coronavirus app due to privacy concerns. Picture: Toby Zerna

Parliament’s leading medico MPs are urging Australians and sceptical colleagues to download a controversial coronavirus tracing app, as they are enlisted into the fight against COVID-19.

Liberal MP Dr Katie Allen and Labor MP Dr Michael Freelander have joined a new government taskforce aimed at providing advice to Australia’s chief medical officers on how to stamp out COVID-19 cases and boosting the capacity of hospitals to deal with outbreaks.

Katie Allen. Picture: David Geraghty

Both MPs see the forthcoming coronavirus app as a vital public health tool in the next phase in containing COVID-19, despite concerns from colleagues like Barnaby Joyce that it gives too much personal data to the federal government.

The former Nationals leader and Deputy Speaker Llew O’Brien both said on Sunday that they will not download the app due to privacy concerns, with Mr Joyce saying he wanted the government to know as little about his personal life as possible.

“It’s important to have a diversity of views and Barnaby has his. Australians will sort through this information and see there is a point to this app: Do you want to know if there is coronavirus in your area?” Dr Allen told The Australian.

“Look at the rollout of MyHealth. Only 10 per cent in the end decided to opt out of giving that personal information, because the public knows knowledge is power.”

“It’s important the app is voluntary. We need to have the social license to do this.”

The contact-tracing app would allow health authorities to alert Australians if they had come close to positive COVID-19 cases by using mobile phone Bluetooth data.

Dr Freelander said the government had to give the public more information on how privacy protections would work, but he considered the app an important part of fighting coronavirus.

“As someone who very strongly believes in civil liberties, I will be downloading the app,” the Labor MP said.

“The privacy provisions need to be reviewed by parliament and there should be a sunset clause on the app.”

Health Minister Greg Hunt said any personal data from the app would only go to public health officials.

“If two people download it we will be in a stronger position. The more people who do this, the better off we will be. But it is an individual choice,” he said in Melbourne.

Opposition health spokesman Chris Bowen said the government needed to more clearly explain the privacy protections in the app.

“At the moment that effort has not been forthcoming. So in that respect it’s unsurprising that liberal and national MPs are saying they won’t download the app,” he said.

Michael Freelander. Picture: AAP

The National COVID-19 Health and Research Advisory Committee will meet for the first time on Monday.

The taskforce will include deputy chief medical officer Michael Kidd, the Doherty Institute’s Sharon Lewin, Dr Allen and Dr Freelander, health researchers and community leaders.

Dr Freelander — a paediatrician of 40 years — said his focus on the committee would be boosting public education about COVID-19.

“Katie and I are both paediatricians so we have a history with infectious diseases,” he said.

“One thing we have to do is better educate young people about this disease and how it can affect them.”

Dr Allen — a population-health expert whose research has focused on changing mass behaviour on allergies — said her goal was to see schools opened again and funnelling ideas on how to tackle the virus.

“It’s exciting being at the grassroots. I was talking to Greg — and I’m sure my colleagues were to — early about the need for telehealth and the importance of border control based off expert opinion in my own electorate. The minister and the Prime Minister took those ideas, ran with it, and have shown great evidence-based leadership,” she said.