Key Points
- A new report says Australia's response to the COVID-19 pandemic failed the nation's most vulnerable people
- It says in many cases, governments' actions amounted to overreach.
For lots of Australians, their experience of the COVID-19 pandemic was one of inconvenience, with missed holidays, home haircuts, and social events moved online.
But for many others, the physical, mental, emotional, and financial cost was much greater.
A new report - - has highlighted who was worst-hit by the handling of the pandemic. Here's what it said.
Culturally and linguistically diverse communities
Most public health messaging only being available in English meant many members of cultural and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities were unable to access or understand essential information, the report said.
Many in the group were also reluctant to seek healthcare, and the way some restrictions were put in place was particularly traumatic for those who had fled from violent or war-torn countries.
"When police and troops came on the streets to enforce lockdown, it sometimes looked to them more like martial law than humanitarian relief," the review, led by former public servant Peter Shergold and funded by the Paul Ramsay Foundation, the Minderoo Foundation and the John and Myriam Wylie Foundation, said.
The strict lockdown of public housing tower blocks in Melbourne in 2020 was found by the Victorian Ombudsman to be , with residents now suing the state government for compensation, .
Over-representation in low-paid and insecure work and having twice the average rate of unemployment meant CALD communities were also more financially disadvantaged than other groups, the report said.
On top of that, people born in certain regions overseas were on average almost three times more likely to die with COVID-19 than their Australian-born peers.
"People born in the UK had similar mortality rates to those born in Australia. But for those born in the Middle East, it was over 12 times as high," the report said.
Temporary migrants and international students
Temporary migrants and international students were impacted by similar language and financial barriers as others from CALD backgrounds.
But unlike permanent residents and citizens, they were ineligible to apply for financial support from the federal government via the JobKeeper wage subsidy scheme or the JobSeeker unemployment payment.
The report said that was the wrong decision, and temporary migrants should have been eligible for financial assistance from the government
For those who worked in industries that ground to a halt during lockdowns, it meant they had to rely on the support of charities, their families, or return to their country of origin.
People with disability
People with disability were confronted by a "triple jeopardy" during the pandemic, the report said, of being at greater risk of getting seriously unwell and dying from the virus, reduced access to healthcare, medications, and therapeutic services, and the lockdowns causing a "particularly detrimental impact" on their contact with family, friends, and support workers.
"It was often difficult to meet physical distancing guidelines and maintain hygiene measures, such as wearing a mask. Vital personal care became harder. Loneliness increased," the report said.
It said most COVID-19 advice documents were only accessible in English and weren’t directed at people with disability, but at their carers.
The federal government introducing support measures for only those covered by the NDIS meant the more than 85 per cent of Australians with a disability who weren't participants in the scheme were excluded from assistance.
Then once vaccines became available, people with disability in residential care were "deprioritised" in the rollout "without any explanation", the report said.
It contributed to the COVID-19 vaccination rate in 2021 for people with disability remaining more than 5 percentage points lower than for the rest of the population.
"Despite hard work and advocacy, the absence of proactive government policy measures to support people with disability made members of the disability community feel like the odds were against them," the report said.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were already affected by disproportionate rates of physical and mental ill health, along with other disadvantages, but the pandemic made them "particularly vulnerable".
The report said that for the first 12 to 18 months of the pandemic, COVID-19 was largely kept out of remote communities thanks to the work of Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations. But once the virus reached those communities, poor funding of those organisations, and inadequate health infrastructure and workforce capacity caused significant problems in containing the virus and treating those infected
Those issues were compounded when governments under-utilised Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations during the vaccine rollout.
Women and children
While the move to remote learning was probably the right decision when the virus was little understood, "it was wrong to close entire school systems, particularly once new information indicated that schools were not high-transmission environments", the report said.
School closures put further pressures on parents, with some women having to withdraw from the paid workforce or juggle their jobs, home learning, and caring responsibilities, which negatively impacted on their mental health and productivity.
"For children and parents (particularly women), we failed to get the balance right between protecting health and imposing long-term costs on education, mental health, the economy and workforce outcomes," the report said.
"Women were over 30 per cent more likely than men to leave the workforce in the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic. They were more likely to lose pay, burn through leave and fall behind on savings and superannuation. New and expectant mothers were isolated from their support networks."
Rates of domestic and family violence also increased, with almost 20 per cent of women experiencing emotionally abusive, harassing, and controlling behaviours in 2020 for the first time.
People in low socioeconomic areas
Students in low socioeconomic areas without access to a computer or internet fell further behind than their more privileged peers and will likely continue to do so, the report said.
"International research suggests that learning losses from lockdowns were up to 60 per cent larger for disadvantaged students from less-educated homes," the report said.
Workers without home offices also struggled, many people in insecure jobs were left without financial support, and those without internet access or low digital literacy found it hard to get support from government services, the report said.
But there weren't just detrimental educational or financial impacts, with the poorest 20 per cent of Australians three times more likely to die of COVID-19 than those in the top 20 per cent.
"Low income and casualised workers were at times asked to choose between earning an income and protecting the community. JobKeeper recipients had their jobs guaranteed by the government. Some saw an increase in pay or were paid not to work. Others, like short-term casual workers, were left out and had to find work in a locked-down economy," the report said.
"Housing inequality saw the virus spread through overcrowded homes, with lockdowns taking a toll on the mental and physical health of people living in cramped conditions. Australia’s homelessness problem was exposed as governments scrambled to bundle the homeless into hotels to curb the spread of the virus."
Aged care residents
The report said that while all older Australia were more likely to be "gravely affected" by contracting COVID-19, those living in aged care were at particular risk.
"They were often frail, and many suffered forms of memory loss or dementia," it said.
"Despite most care homes having well-tested infection control procedures for influenza and gastroenteritis, it became obvious that the pandemic was more virulent."
Many hospitals were reluctant to accept COVID-infected aged care residents, fearing it would result in intensive care units being overwhelmed, the report said.
"The results were catastrophic," it said.
"More than 75 per cent of all COVID-19-related deaths in 2020 occurred among residents in aged care facilities, a significantly higher proportion than peer countries."
By the middle of this year, more than a quarter of COVID-related deaths in Australia had occurred in residential aged care facilities.
What can we learn for the next pandemic?
Professor Shergold called on Australian governments to consider the report's recommendations, which include putting the most vulnerable at the centre of future health crisis planning.
It also recommends the establishment of an Australian centre for disease control, more transparency around decision making and better collaboration across state lines.
"It's imperative that we heed these lessons and take action to ensure we're better prepared for whatever the next health crisis is - because we know there will be another one," Professor Shergold said in a statement.
With AAP
