Good afternoon. My name is Allison McMillan. I'm the
Commonwealth Chief Nursing and Midwifery Officer and I'm here
to provide the Australian Government update on the COVID-19 pandemic.
So I can tell you that today in Australia we have
in the last 24 hours, 216 new cases of COVID-19. That brings us to
a total of 34,812.
Four of those cases were in New South
Wales. 208 in Victoria. Two in Queensland. One in Western
Australia and one in South Australia. Sadly we've seen now 502 deaths across
Australia related to COVID-19 and again
I offer my condolences to anyone who has lost a loved one family or friend
to this COVID outbreak and pass on my condolences to all of them.
17 deaths in the last 24 hours in Australia.
Those are in Victoria. We have 4,261 active cases
currently across the country. 604 people in hospital and 39 of those
are in intensive care. Now across Australia we have been
incredibly successful in promoting testing and we've seen more than 5.5
million tests conducted across the country
since the outbreak of this pandemic and we continue to encourage anyone,
if you have any symptoms whatsoever however mild
it is really important that you get tested.
Stay at home, get tested and we will help across the country to prevent the
transmission of this disease and hopefully return at some point to a
more normal life. Today I'd particularly like to
to call my enormous respect and appreciation for all health
care workers and aged care workers, disability workers, anyone working in
this extremely challenging time in Australia but particularly to those
in Victoria. Where we're seeing people working in
aged care facilities and in hospital at the front line with
COVID positive. Particularly again in this International
year of the Nurse and Midwife. It is so important to recognise and
acknowledge the terrific work they all do.
I recently returned from Victoria where I was privileged to work with many of my
colleagues who are doing such an amazing job and
again we thank them for that wholeheartedly. Not
only from myself but on behalf of the Australian Government and I think
all Australians across the country for the terrific work that they do.
So I'm going to go now to questions and Jade do you have a question for me?
Reporter: Can I just ask if you're concerned about the cluster
that has emerged in Queensland? And also, ahead of Federal Parliament
returning tomorrow, do you think that given those extra cases in
Queensland that there should be any further restrictions on
Queensland politicians when they come to Canberra?
Thank you Jade. So the yes the outbreak
in Queensland we are monitoring very closely. We
have enormous confidence in the terrific work that Professor
Janet Young and her team are doing to identify the source of these outbreaks
and do that extensive testing. We are encouraged that they are really,
really well across this outbreak and are working to contain it as quickly as they
can. The necessary arrangements for
parliament returning this week is that parliament like any other
workplace is a - does need to comply with COVID safe
requirements and we will see everyone doing that in a very
sensible way. So we will see them taking all of the necessary precautions.
I don't believe that there's any need at this point in time to do anything
further for the politicians returning from Queensland. I would
suggest that they're already here.
Thanks Jade. Cassandra?
Reporter: Hello. Yes, some medical experts have raised possible
safety concerns over a fast-tracked COVID-19 vaccine, yet the
Government hasn't ruled out policy measures compelling Australians
to take it when it becomes available. Is that appropriate?
Thank you Cassandra. We are extremely encouraged in Australia about all of the
work going on across the world in relation to finding a vaccine for
this virus. Australia has very, very strong
regulatory systems in place to ensure that if and when any vaccine
becomes available it will go through all of those
necessary checks and balances to ensure that it's provided safely and
effectively to the Australian community and we won't
sidestep those necessary requirements. There are
obviously there's a great focus at the moment on the Oxford
vaccine but there are numerous other vaccines coming to clinical trial across
the world. As always we will be ensuring we provide
clear accurate and concise information to
all Australians about the nature of the vaccine
and how safe it is and we hope and encourage all Australians to
seek out the information from a reliable source.
Tamson?
Reporter: Thanks, Alison. I was just wondering if you could explain
the current advice for all Australians around hugs and handshakes
and how long you imagine that the advice will be in place. And what’s the
importance of keeping up social distancing no matter how much
we’d all like to be hugging our friends and family at the moment?
Thank you Tamsin. So the
questions are really important about hugs and handshakes. If
you - I suggest that we have reached a point at the moment where a handshake
is no longer something we should be doing socially. It has become very much
part of our culture of a very long time. Handshakes are something we should avoid
at this point in time we all know that. When it comes to hugs, I encourage you
to if you are within your family unit the
people you live with whether it's your children or your loved
one of course if they live with you, you can hug, but
when it comes to the broader community and hugging
others outside of your family unit, then no.
We really think that this point in time we need to think of
innovative and different ways to show a welcome or a greeting to someone but
not a hug. Tamsin, I think at some point perhaps
in the future we may reach a point where we would see
hugging again but not at this point in time.
Thanks Tamsin.
Reporter: Alison, I'm wondering about Parliament. I thought
it was not compulsory to wear the masks next week. Is that an impression…
is that the wrong impression?
It's my understanding yes there's
no requirement in parliament for parliamentarians to
wear masks. Obviously everyone may choose to wear a
mask and we encourage them then to do it safely and follow the sort of
requirements we've provided advice on but masks are not mandated in parliament
Reporter:And one more question. Just regarding vaccines, I guess,
I just heard it – and I might have this wrong totally – but the vaccine
doesn’t actually kill the virus. Is that correct, or have I got that wrong?
Vaccine - vaccines can work in a range of different ways but
essentially what we're looking to do with a vaccine
is to create a response to our immune system
in order that if we do become exposed to the vaccine
we're able to fight it and we don't get infected by it.
It doesn't kill it as such but it does prevent us from becoming
infected because our immune system has been
bolstered in order that it won't affect us just finally
Reporter: Just finally, just regarding vaccines again, the- I guess
in the past, vaccines have taken years and years and so many years to
circulate throughout the world. What’s the chance nowadays for this
sort of thing to…
I would so - in relation to the development of a vaccine for COVID-19
the best minds in the world have all turned their attention to this and we
are seeing the Australian Government has
invested significant amounts of money in a number of vaccines in Australia and
we're seeing a broad range of vaccines being
considered. They come in a range of shapes and forms
but we are already early encouraged by as I said the Oxford
work which is now at an extensive clinical trial but there are many others
we may see a series of vaccines coming
available for human testing and human use over the
next period of time as we see this
this work progress.
Reporter: [Indistinct] I mean distribution. You know, distribution of
vaccines around the world. How long would that take? Because you
see, you know, in TV and stuff like that it’s still going on to how
many years [indistinct]… you know distribution of vaccines around the world how
In relation to
distribution obviously each country will take particular approaches to how they
might go about distributing a vaccine and a
prioritization but in general terms we do identify priority
groups and I would see that across the world.
The World Health Organization obviously will play an important part
in ensuring the wide distribution of a vaccine to
all across the world
Thank you. Thank you for your time.