Editorial
Aged-care homes need more cash to cope with COVID-19
The acute danger COVID-19 poses around the world to the residents of aged-care homes was highlighted this week when Britain belatedly included in its death toll statistics the individuals who died outside of hospital. They showed that in the past two weeks alone, there were 4343 additional deaths.
Aged-care homes are especially dangerous because older people are much more likely to die of the disease and it is hard to maintain social distancing when residents share dining halls and other facilities. Staff come into contact with tens of residents every day.
So far, with a few tragic exceptions, Australia has been successful in avoiding the worst. While 12 people have died in an outbreak at the Newmarch home at Caddens in Sydney’s west and a new cluster of three cases has just been identified at a home in Melbourne’s east, the number of deaths has been a tiny fraction of other countries.
This has been achieved by early action and tough quarantine measures, including restrictions on visits.
Yet as in many areas, now that the number of COVID-19 cases has fallen in the community, the debate has moved on and a discussion is starting about how to ease these restrictions while keeping the risk of further infections at a reasonable level.
Over the past week, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has argued that current isolation measures are too extreme and he is concerned about the mental health of old people cut off from contact with friends and family.
He wants homes to agree to abide by guidelines that allow up to two visits a day by designated carers in areas away from the public spaces of the facility.
It is hard to know how many homes are complying with the guidelines. There is anecdotal evidence that in some cases visits even by loved ones have been banned, but the sector says this is not widespread.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison wants restrictions on visits to aged-care homes to ease due to mental health concerns. Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
The aged-care industry argues that if some homes have adopted tougher rules it is partly because of mixed messaging about social distancing for older people. While aged-care homes are told they have to let in two visitors per resident, elderly people still living on their own have been told they should isolate themselves completely. NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said she would not visit her parents at all during the crisis.
In any case, if Mr Morrison is concerned about the mental health of people in aged care and wants more people permitted to visit, he should start by helping aged-care homes deal with the increased costs associated with making it safe to let in visitors.
Aged-care homes require extra staff to disinfect and conduct temperature checks on all people entering their facilities. They have to offer paid sick leave to staff with even slight symptoms to stop people with COVID-19 coming to work. They have to buy huge quantities of personal protective equipment and train staff to prepare for an outbreak.
These costs have only aggravated the financial strain on the system exposed by the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety. The sector says the government has so far covered only about 15 per cent of the extra costs incurred thanks to COVID-19.
Given the billions that have been thrown at fighting the epidemic, Mr Morrison should offer more support to this high-risk sector. As the economy opens up and the risk of further outbreaks once again rises, older Australians are the people who are most in need of protection.