I would encourage people to become familiar with the supports that are in place. Support is already there for those who are in the situation, where they are forced, because of a state government requirement to isolate, to access the pandemic relief payment. Large numbers of Australians have done that, and it has been an important tool that we have had, has been funded together with the states and territories.
Our health professionals understand, like in every single country, you are not going to capture every case, you do not capture every case now with PCR, and that is why we are moving to ensure that we could get that transfer from PCR tests to rapid antigen tests, for the sheer bulk, and for the states to put in place the best way they came to record as many of those cases as they can. That gives you the trends, gives you an indication of what the potential impact sell your hospital system, but I do not agree with the assertion that says it cannot be done, of course it can be done. It has been done in other countries, and that is what the state will put in place now.
But what I stress is, what is more important than knowing how many cases there are, which frankly is getting less and less important, what matters is (people in hospitals, in intensive care, and on ventilators) that is the real measure of what the impact is. The real issue is that people are connected to care. That is what I am concerned about, I want to make sure that if somebody has Covid that they are connected to the care and support that are available, including the pandemic leave payments.
