Coronavirus: 11 homes accounted for almost half of Victoria’s aged-care Covid fatalities

After fending off The Australian’s questions for almost seven weeks, leaked details of Victoria’s aged care debacle are confirmed.

St Basil's home for the aged in Fawkner, Melbourne. Picture: Stefan Postles

Just 11 Victorian aged-care facilities account for 36 per cent of Victoria’s coronavirus deaths, and 46 per cent of those deaths in aged care, according to leaked data ­confirmed by the state health ­department.

The 11 homes accounted for 245 of Victoria’s total 675 coronavirus deaths as of Monday (that number had risen to 683 on Tuesday), with a total of 528 deaths linked to aged care as of Monday (534 on Tuesday).

The confirmation comes after the federal government had repeatedly refused to release the ­information.

The Australian first asked the Andrews government for a breakdown of deaths by aged-care facility on July 24, and was told the information could not be released for privacy reasons.

“This isn’t about withholding information — this is about following a long standard practice about protecting the identification of deaths,” a spokeswoman for Premier Daniel Andrews said at the time.

More recently the Andrews government has pointed to the federal government’s responsibility for regulating aged care, saying it was up to the commonwealth to release the data.

There were 863 active cases linked to aged-care facilities on Tuesday, down from a peak of 2075 on August 16.

The following three aged-care facilities, among the 11, led the count of deaths as of Monday:

• St Basil’s Homes for the Aged in Fawkner, in Melbourne’s north: 44 deaths and 206 cases;

• Epping Gardens Aged Care in Epping, in Melbourne’s north: 35 deaths and 215 cases;

• Kalyna Aged Care in Del­ahey, in Melbourne’s northwest: 22 deaths. The number of cases is not known, but is fewer than 116.