Good afternoon everybody. Dr Nick Coatsworth
with today's national coronavirus update. To the 24 hours to 12 noon today
we have reported a total of 25,923 cases of COVID-19 during this pandemic
in Australia, 109 of those were newly confirmed in the
past 24 hours. New South Wales has 17 new cases.
One was overseas acquired, 15 were locally acquired and contacts of
confirmed cases and one was locally acquired and a
contact has not yet been identified. Victoria reported 90 new cases of
COVID-19. 22 were locally acquired and contacts of
confirmed cases and 68 remain under investigation.
Queensland has reported two new cases, both of which were locally acquired and
contacts of confirmed cases. There have been six deaths
overnight from COVID-19, bringing the national number
of deaths due to COVID-19 to 660. At this point in time there are 432
people hospitalized in the country and 23 of those are in Intensive Care
Units. There's been a lot of discussion,
particularly with some unseasonably warm
weather over the past few days, of what the likely impact of warmer
weather might be on COVID-19. There's been particular
discussion about whether the virus might be less transmitted
during the summer months as influenza would be.
We have to be clear that we do not yet know the impact
of the seasons on COVID-19. We absolutely cannot assume that
because we're moving into the summer months when other respiratory viruses
traditionally decrease that COVID-19 would also decrease.
What we do know about summer though is that Australians will get outside,
and they should in the states where they're
able to do so. And as restrictions are lifted in Victoria, so too will
Victorians be able to get out and enjoy the warmer weather.
But when people are getting outside, that means
two important things that affect COVID-19 transmission: one is movement
of people across cities, across states and the second one is
crowds, which we see frequently.
So if we can't assume that COVID will be any less transmitted,
we have to assume that that movement and crowds could potentially bring
risk. And indeed we have seen in the northern hemisphere
COVID running rampant across many nations during the summer months
as holiday makers go to and from countries in Europe
bringing the disease back into their own country and sparking
new outbreaks of COVID-19. So the message is,
as we move into the summer months, treat the summer with as much
caution as you've treated winter and that means
keep physical distance. That means get tested if you're at all unwell.
Don't go to a family gathering down at the beach
if you're unwell or the kids are unwell. Stay at home and get yourself tested.
Wear a mask if you're on public transport going to and from
those areas. It's very hard to find a park in most of the beaches in Sydney so
a lot of people use the train and public transport. Critically
important to wear a mask as you're doing that.
Excellent hand hygiene of course and there has never been a better time
to download the COVIDSafe app and have
it active on your phone when you're highly likely
to be around people who you don't know at close distance for 15 minutes or more.
Now i've got two journalists on the phone today and so I'll go
to Dana first.
Thanks Dr Coatsworth. I just have a question
about moving out of Stage 4 in Victoria.
The National Cabinet approach has been
to suppress the virus, not to try to eliminate it.
If that's AHPPC advice, is that still
the official advice, is that the way that Victoria should be moving out of
restrictions? Well Dana there are two different
things. The first one which is the
National Cabinet agreed AHPPC position
is for aggressive suppression of COVID-19. That hasn't changed.
Several weeks ago we discussed this again
and reiterated, or gave clarity to, what aggressive suppression means.
And the target is no community transmission
of COVID-19. Now clearly that will not be the threshold
that Victoria uses to determine how they lift their
restrictions. But in terms of that decision making,
that will be very much the decision making of the
Victorian Chief Health Officer, Professor Brett Sutton, in conjunction
with his premier and cabinet. I understand that's going to be
articulated on Sunday and the
Australian Health Protection Principal Committee's role
therein is to provide advice to Professor Sutton.
Paul Kelly of course and Professor Sutton talk
on a very regular basis about these sort of issues so
we have to separate, to conclude the response we have to separate those two
things - the aggressive suppression model where we go
for no community transmission, that's the end game, that's
what all states and territories in Australia are aiming for.
The road out of restrictions for Victoria
will be based on different thresholds that
they will no doubt articulate in the coming days.
Rose.
Thanks Dr Coatsworth. I wanted to ask you whether you believe
it's possible to adopt a national definition
of a COVID-19 hotspot?
Well it's certainly very challenging to adopt a national definition of a COVID
hotspot. But it may well be something that
we need to do. It's going to be discussed at National
Cabinet this Friday, the importance of having a
national definition of a hotspot. But if I can describe some of the AHPPC
conversations on this matter and some of
the reasons why the hotspot definition is so difficult to come to.
Firstly you need to know why we're defining a hotspot. Is it about
travel across interstate borders? Is it about the public health measures that an
individual state is going to introduce in response to one,
two, five or ten cases? There are different
reasons why you might want to define a hotspot.
And the reasons why you want to define the hotspot
actually affects the definition. Now that sounds a bit like a circular
argument and that's because it is. You really
have to take into account not just the
numbers but also the circumstance surrounding COVID-19 cases. Are we
talking about a densely populated urban area? Are we
talking about a town of 10? Are we talking about a remote
Indigenous community? All of those circumstances have very
different sorts of responses. However - go ahead - Sorry I'm just going to follow up
and say, do you believe any definition should be used to determine
who can travel intrastate or interstate?
Well I believe that it's going to be critically important
to have that discussion at National Cabinet informed by the AHPPC
discussions. We will clearly be able to be a bit more,
give a bit more fulsome response after the National Cabinet has occurred.
The importance of having that discussion though is absolutely clear:
why do we want to have a definition of hotspots for the purposes of
understanding movement across state borders?
And that is so Australians can understand the circumstances under which
borders may be opened and closed. Having said that,
it is, and always will be, the position of the AHPPC
that it's a matter for individual state Chief Health Officers
and their premiers whether the borders are opened or closed.
And how would you personally define a hotspot at the moment?
Well I'm part of the AHPPC so my personal
opinion on hotspot doesn't actually matter too much and I'd
take a step back and just reiterate my previous response to the question,
which is the definition of a hotspot depends on why we want to define
a hotspot and what response that's going to give.
And as I said, we'll be able to more fully discuss these matters once the
discussion at National Cabinet has taken place.
Okay. So it sounds like you're not overly optimistic that there can be a national
set of rules or a national definition on a hotspot
agreed to on Friday? I wouldn't say that at all.
I'm always an optimist but this is a decision of national
significance and appropriately our national leaders will
be discussing it on Friday. And I've got a another question on
the phone. Thanks for making the
effort to come down.
The public is well aware of the sprint by the pharmaceutical companies
to find a vaccination for this
COVID-19. I'm just wondering, is there any research by the government or
established groups for examining changes
to lifestyle which would maintain or improve the average person's immune
competency and resistance to the virus? Sorry could
you just repeat that last bit of the question?
I'm just wondering if there's any government or established research
focus for examining changes to lifestyle which would maintain or improve the
average person's immune competency or resistance to the
virus? I think I understand the question,
being, are there any general measures that we can do that are being researched that
are going to boost our immune system? And I think we are absolutely confident
that being as healthy as you can possibly can be
is your best protection against COVID-19, getting severe COVID-19.
So we don't really need to do too much research into that. We know that
things like quitting smoking are going to be an
excellent and important thing to do. That's self-evident.
Losing weight is going to be important. The general measures of having a
balanced diet. If you have any co-morbid conditions and
when I say co-morbid, that means any other health
conditions, so diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease,
the most important thing you can do at the moment is discuss with your GP
about how you get those in the top control that you possibly can.
And all those measures are going to help with your natural immunity
and help you if you get COVID-19.
Of course what they don't do is actually stop you from acquiring
it, and the way you do that is by keeping physical distance,
avoiding people, getting tested if you're unwell, washing
your hands, wearing a mask, all those things. So first thing to
do is stay healthy. Second thing to do is avoid getting it. Is there any
research being done on people who have contracted it but not
got sick? Like what makes them different?
Is there any research going into that study as well?
is there any research into ... So that that would be case control studies where you
look at people who contracted the disease and compare them
with people that haven't. Most of those studies would look
at particular risk factors for acquiring COVID-19. But severe
disease, that's usually where the
comparison lies and that's how we know that people
who are older and who have more of those added health conditions are at
risk of more severe disease. Now I'll just go back to Dana in case
she's got one other question. No I think you covered it thanks doctor.
Okay. And Rose? Dr Coatsworth I wondered whether you think mystery
cases are more important to focus on when defining a hotspot
as opposed to those cases with known sources. And what sort of parameters
you're looking at when coming up with possible definitions?
Yes so that answer we can say a
definite yes to. That it is of more
concern when you have mystery cases where
you can't establish where the chain of transmission is, than it is where you
have cases where you're clearly able to
work out the chains of transmission and you can look at the example of
Bateman's Bay Soldiers Club down in New South Wales where they were
able to get on top of that by identifying all
the transmission links and then after, because
people were then isolated, the transmission in the south east
of New South Wales effectively stopped.
So it is the case that mystery cases, even at low numbers, are of concern.
Just to finish off on the answer of that question, how do we actually
establish if a mystery case has a link?
Well you've got to look at the contacts of that particular case for the 14 days
prior. You would typically, and this is being
done in New South Wales and likely also in Victoria, you would
test those contacts, what we call the upstream
contacts, even if they're not symptomatic, often we would ask them to be tested
both with the nasal swab and potentially with
a blood test to see if they've got any antibodies.
And the last thing which has proved to be very very useful,
and you know it's not something that we would have ever been able to be
used in the early part of the 21st century, it's a new technology called
genomics, where we're actually able to map the
sequence, the genetic sequence of the virus
and then use that with our public health knowledge to form those
links. But the short answer to your question is yes.
And does it make sense medically to restrict someone's movement if they have
been in a hot spot? And a hot spot as defined nationally across the country?
Well again that speaks to my previous answer of
what the hotspot definition is for.
Let's look at a concrete example in
New South Wales at the moment, which is where you have cases within
specific suburbs, or say the Tattersalls gymnasium,
that you define that as a place where you want to do
increased testing, where you want to test asymptomatic people,
where you want people who have been to a certain area,
at a certain club or a gym, to actually isolate themselves for 14 days.
So that is a form of movement restriction within a city
where you're asking people to isolate who have been to that
venue. But you can see the difference between that and then
making the decision that an entire state border
needs to be closed. So it's a very
complicated definition, the one of hotspots and
it will continue to be applied in different ways
by the Chief Health Officers necessarily because the circumstances of each
particular outbreak differ so much from state to state and region to
region. Thank you.
OK. Great. Thanks very much. Cheers. No more questions. Thank you.