Page 3379 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 19 August 2009
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public anxiety over H1N1 09. Extra communication steps are required to notify family members when death occurs, and these are in place.
The Acting Chief Executive, the Chief Health Officer and I have all provided written apologies to the family. We did that pretty much immediately on the family raising their concerns directly with us. It was certainly before I left for overseas. ACT Health senior staff met with family members to discuss their concerns and to personally apologise for any distress caused. I have thought about this. I think that is an appropriate way to express our apology. I do not think there is much to be gained from continuing to go public on this individual’s case. Senior staff from ACT Health remain available to the family to discuss issues of concern with the family.
In relation to the apologies that have been given, while I was overseas the Chief Health Officer provided comments, which obviously were public because he was responding to media inquiries, and he confirmed the apology already given. I do not think there was an extra apology that was given to the media that was not given to the family. It was merely confirming the fact that he had, that I had and that the Acting Chief Executive had all expressed our apologies and condolences for the loss of their family member and the distress that was caused.
The government will support Mr Hanson’s motion. I have probably addressed as much as I can of the elements of that motion. An amendment has been circulated in my name picking up the final points of Mr Hanson’s speech. I move:
Add:
“(3) acknowledges the sustained hard work and hours that a large number of ACT Health staff in the Population Health Division, the Emergency Departments of The Canberra Hospital and Calvary Public Hospital, Community Health, and also comprise support staff throughout ACT Health including Marketing and Communications and Executive Coordination have put in since the advent of the H1N1 epidemic in Canberra in May.”.
My amendment is to acknowledge the amount of work that is going on in all aspects of ACT Health in relation to the swine flu pandemic. Yes, we have had this situation, which has certainly not been ideal and changes have been made and apologies have been expressed. But I do not think anyone in here without the thorough knowledge of the briefings that I have had can understand exactly the hours that have gone in from our public health officials—our doctors, our GPs and our nurses—in dealing with the extra workload that comes from having the H1N1 pandemic.
I would hate to see that some of their efforts were viewed as less worthy because of this individual case. We have been up-front. We have acknowledged that there have been issues. We have sought to address them. We have changed our processes. This issue was complicated by the fact that the H1N1 status was not managed within the hospital. It happened after that.
I am not trying to take away from the motion at all. I understand other members might think I am trying to shy away from acknowledging that this issue occurred. I am in no way doing that. I am merely adding another paragraph that acknowledges the sustained hard work and what is going on and, in fact, acknowledges that this is going
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