Double virus dose: Covid-19, flu squeezes economy

A winter wave of Covid and ­flu sparks threatens to disrupt transport, freight and supermarkets and could act as a handbrake on the economy.

Medical experts have sounded the alarm on elevated Covid and flu numbers remaining for ‘at least another month’.

A winter wave of Covid-19 and ­influenza threatens to force hundreds of thousands of workers to stay home over the next month, exacerbating staffing shortages and sparking warnings of disruptions to transport, freight services and supermarkets that could act as a handbrake on the economy.

Medical experts on Friday sounded the alarm on elevated Covid and flu numbers remaining for “at least another month”, with a further 200,000 Australians testing positive for coronavirus in the past week and Health Minister Mark Butler warning of a “third wave” of the virus in coming months.

The Health Department has revealed the weekly number of confirmed influenza cases had ­already exceeded the five-year ­average and reached more than 147,000 in this season alone.

But experts have argued the ­official numbers for both illnesses are a vast undercount, likely representing fewer than 40 per cent of the true caseload across the community.

The rise of new Omicron sub-variants BA4 and 5 in Australia is risking a repeat round of infections for people who have already had Covid, with the added concern that BA5 has evolved to ­attack the lungs.

Sickness was blamed for low staffing levels at Virgin Australia’s check-in area at Melbourne Airport on Friday, resulting in long waits for passengers, and corporate employees stepping in to assist customers. An airline spokeswoman said they were “not ­immune to the challenges being experienced globally”.

Qantas was also relying on head office staff to lend a hand at airports and had increased the number of people on standby rosters by 20 per cent.

Fred Harrison, boss of independent supermarket chain Ritchies, said the disruption to his business caused by Covid-19 was “horrendous”. Existing staffing shortages were being exacerbated by high levels of cold and flu running through the community, Mr Harrison said.

“It is very challenging. We are still at high levels of Covid in our business,” he said. “There’s people with colds and flu, which is another complication.”

The winter wave of Covid and the flu, and the rise of the Omicron sub-variants, were discussed on Friday at the first meeting of federal and state health ministers since the election of the Albanese government in May.

Graphic: The Australian

Mr Butler said he was concerned about a “third wave” of Covid, with both case numbers and hospitalisations increasing as Omicron BA4 and 5 became the predominant strains.

“So even if you caught Covid in that summer wave … where millions of Australians caught Covid, if you’ve only had two doses … you are potentially susceptible to reinfection over the coming months,” he said. “All of the health authorities do expect for there to be a third wave of Omicron over the coming months, I think the impact on our hospital system … is still not really well known. But we do need to prepare ourselves for another wave of increased cases.”

Business groups expressed concern about the impact on the economy of the elevated caseload at a time of acute labour shortages, with unions calling for continuing support payments for workers laid up with Covid.

Business Council chief executive Jennifer Westacott said: ­“Labour shortages don’t just mean customers wait longer, they risk putting a handbrake on our recovery by kneecapping productivity, creating blockages at key economic chokepoints like freight and airports and increasing costs.”

Australian Chamber of ­Commerce and Industry chief executive Andrew McKellar said the spate of Covid and flu-related absences, combined with the existing national staff shortage, was causing a double blow to productivity.

“Some businesses that are ­already in a fragile position due to labour shortages will have no choice but to close their doors temporarily when illness hits,” Mr McKellar said.

“Staff shortages haven’t been more acute in living memory. Small businesses suffered the shock of enforced shutdowns during the height of the pandemic. Now, they are the most vulnerable to staff absences if illness enters the workplace.”

The official numbers show NSW led the way on Covid-19 cases recorded over the past week, with more than 61,000 people testing positive, followed by more than 51,000 in Victoria. And there were almost 35,000 new cases across the country in the 24 hours to July 1, along with 33 deaths.

Meanwhile, the rate of influenza skyrocketed in some states beyond anything seen in recent years, with almost 500 people ­diagnosed in Tasmania between May and June compared to fewer than 100 cases recorded in the same time period over the past four years. Victoria confirmed it had recorded a rate of seven influenza diagnoses per 1000 general practitioner consults.

“The number of notified cases of laboratory confirmed influenza is over 416 times higher than the number notified by the same time in 2021,” a statement from the Victorian government said.

“But (it’s) only 30 per cent higher than the number in 2019 prior to the Covid pandemic.”

Catherine Bennett, chair of epidemiology at Deakin University, said it was likely both the official flu and Covid counts represented less than 40 per cent of actual cases. “With Covid especially a lot of people are asymptomatic or have only mild symptoms, so they continue on with their normal lives, but they can spread it to others,” she said. “And there are many others who are testing positive with RATs at home, then not reporting it anywhere.”

She said workplaces would need to manage “at least another month with Covid and flu numbers remaining high”. “The problem for a small business is that their workers might pass it on to each other, then they might get the flu, and after that enough time has passed so there’s potentially the next round of Covid,” she said. “It could circulate through workplaces for a long time.”

The high case numbers have prompted concern over paid pandemic leave ending, with unions calling for the government to extend the payment. Up until June 30, the federal government provided lump payments for those self-isolating for seven days due to Covid-19, with $450 offered to workers who had lost between eight and 20 hours of work and $750 if they lost 20 hours or more.

Transport Workers Union ­national assistant secretary Nick McIntosh said paid pandemic leave “was a lifeline”.

The ACTU said the decision to end the payment would force frontline health workers to “make impossible choices between obeying isolation rules and paying their bills”.

ACTU president Michele O’Neil said the pandemic leave payment had been “one of our best defences against new waves of infection”. “This decision will result in workers working while they are sick, which we have known since the first days of the pandemic is a certain way to more rapidly spread the virus,” she said.

Additional reporting: Robyn Ironside, Eli Greenblat