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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-06-17 Daily Xml
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Ministerial Statement

SWINE FLU

The Hon. J.D. HILL (Kaurna—Minister for Health, Minister for the Southern Suburbs, Minister Assisting the Premier in the Arts) (16:15): I seek leave to make a ministerial statement.

Leave granted.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: South Australia is now implementing a new pandemic phase to minimise the impact of the H1N1 influenza 09 virus. The federal Minister for Health, Nicola Roxon, and the Chief Medical Officer have either just completed or are in the process of completing a statement to the public based on decisions made across the nation today by all the jurisdictions.

The move to the 'protect' phase, as it will be called, is in line with the response announced by the federal government and other states, based on advice from the commonwealth and state chief medical officers. South Australia and Western Australia are moving to the new stage immediately, and all other states will be at that same place by Friday 26 June. Victoria has already moved to a 'modified sustain' stage, which I guess is the equivalent.

All the evidence so far shows that swine flu, in most cases, is a mild illness, and not everyone who contracts it needs to see a doctor, be tested or receive antiviral treatment. The growth in confirmed cases across the country and across the world is evidence that it is no longer possible to contain the virus in any particular geographic area.

The 'protect' phase will focus on identifying and treating those who are most vulnerable to developing serious complications from the virus. This includes people with existing chronic conditions, such as heart disease, chronic lung disease, diabetes, pregnant women and people who are morbidly obese. As part of the 'protect' phase of the response in South Australia:

people with mild disease will be advised to stay at home until they are well, and over-the-counter medication (such as paracetamol) will be recommended to treat the symptoms of their illness. To make that plain, they will not be provided with Tamiflu or other antiviral material if they have a mild case of the disease;

contacts of people confirmed with swine flu will no longer be asked to stay in home isolation unless they themselves develop flulike symptoms;

only the vulnerable and those who are very unwell and need to be hospitalised will be recommended for testing for swine flu and treated with antivirals;

SA Health will continue to monitor these results and collect statistics on the spread of the virus, and the spread of seasonal flu. We will not be testing every case, of course;

the commonwealth government will discontinue its border measures.

School or class closures will no longer be routinely introduced, as this is not regarded as an effective way of stopping the spread of the virus now that it is more widespread in the community. Students will also no longer be asked to stay in home isolation if they have travelled to high prevalence areas. However, we will continue to ask parents to keep their children home if they are sick and keep them there until they are well.

Students from four schools who are currently in home isolation because of classroom closures are no longer required to stay at home until the end of the seven day isolation period. Parents should contact their school to discuss when students can return to classes. The best way to limit the spread of all influenza viruses is to practice good personal hygiene, such as washing your hands regularly and covering your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough and sneeze. We currently have been notified of more than 450 cases of seasonal influenza and 107 cases of swine flu in South Australia. Good hygiene practices will help to restrict the spread of both seasonal and swine flu this winter. Antivirals from the national or state medical stockpiles will be provided to those people with moderate or severe disease or whose underlying conditions, after appropriate clinical assessment, could make them vulnerable to severe infection.

Members of the public who would like more information about human swine influenza should contact the swine flu hotline on 180 2007, or visit www.flu.sa.gov.au. Again, I would like to thank the officers of the health department and the medical officers and other officers in the Communicable Diseases Branch for their outstanding efforts over the past month, or so, in trying to limit the spread of this disease. I think we have done remarkably well given the proximity of a large outbreak in Victoria.

We now are at the practical point where we need to move to the next stage, and we have made the decision to do that immediately. That is called the 'protect stage'. The goals during the protect stage will be to protect those in our community who are most at risk of being made seriously ill by this illness as they would be from any seasonal influenza. We are optimistic, of course, that vaccine will be made available towards the end of July and, perhaps, in August. Until that time we will go through every possible effort to make sure that those who are in the vulnerable categories that I have described are looked after as best the system can look after them. I thank the house for its attention.

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