In recent days we have heard in the media of an AV crew being sent to a premises where a Covid positive person had devastatingly died only 6 hours prior. No system was in place to warn the crew of the Covid status of the premises.
In March and April of 2020 the AEAV proposed a central registry of Covid premises to DHHS and AV. DHHS rejected the proposal in meetings claiming that it was too difficult and there were issues with confidentiality. An email was sent to DHHS which was ignored:
A couple of months ago the DoH announced that they were finally implementing the scheme and were patting themselves on the back for their efforts to protect workers. In a meeting with DoH officials 2 weeks ago they confirmed that the program had started and that AV would be informing crews of the Covid risk prior to arrival. Clearly that has not happened. AV and DoH have dragged their feet on this for 17 months and in doing so have increased the risk and anxiety not only for frontline workers, but also their families.
