Opinion: Hub will be a positive for Toowoomba residents

“Surely a purpose-built segregated facility with separated airconditioning systems and a resident care and security staff would benefit all Queenslanders.”

TRC Mayor Paul Antonio (left) and Groom MP Garth Hamilton after talking to media about the Wagners plan for a COVID quarantine hub next to the Wellcamp Airport, Monday, January 25, 2021. Picture: Kevin Farmer

There seems to be great deal of opposition to the idea of a quarantine facility at Wellcamp.

Personally I think a self-contained quarantine facility makes good sense.

Hotel quarantine was always going to be difficult with staff coming and going in the city, and the new strains of COVID, much more infectious and apparently air-transmissible make the situation worse.

Hotels have centralised airconditioning and an air-transmissible virus could conceivably spread in the same way as legionnaires Disease did in hospitals, and hotel quarantine may therefore become untenable.

As to the question of a local quarantine centre exposing Toowoomba residents to COVID, well, Toowoomba does not exist in a vacuum.

People travel between Brisbane and Toowoomba every day, and a serious outbreak in Brisbane could easily make its way here.

Or to Chinchilla, another proposed site where a camp already exists but where the locals have already voiced their opposition.

If NIMBYism is to rule the day, then where would be remote enough? Eromanga? Urandangi? Normanton?

Surely a purpose-built segregated facility with separated airconditioning systems and a resident care and security staff would benefit all Queenslanders.

Staff crew changes could be done by plane or bus via the Toowoomba Bypass and not even come near the city centre.

And, having built an international airport from scratch and kicked off an industrial centre, I’m sure Wagners could build a safe and compliant quarantine centre in their sleep.

A.R. KENNY, Toowoomba