Commies in Australia pushing for lock-down
Australian doctors condemn government response to COVID-19 “disaster”
Thousands of doctors across Australia have signed open letters to the federal government demanding an immediate national lockdown and the urgent pouring of resources into the public hospitals in order to “avert disaster” even worse than that in Italy.
The alarm raised by the doctors, who are on the frontline of the COVID-19 pandemic, is an indictment of the federal and state governments, Liberal-National Coalition and Labor Party alike, which are refusing to take urgently needed measures to protect the public.
Governments at all levels are pouring billions of dollars into the protecting the corporate elite via “stimulus packages.” Yet education facilities and other large workplaces remain open and no comprehensive program of testing has been implemented to even ascertain the extent of infection within the population.
At least 2,500 doctors have signed one letter, circulated by Dr Hemant Garg, saying they are “dismayed at the disconnect between the actions being taken within the medical community and the recommendation for actions being passed on to the general population…
“We should immediately recommend a three- to four-week closure of schools, cultural and religious places, including places of worship, gyms and leisure centres, pubs, bars, theatres, cinemas and concert halls,” the letter states. “This would allow a steady declaration of cases of coronavirus to present to hospitals and fever clinics as their symptomatic phase develops.”
Almost 4,000 medical professionals and experts have signed another letter, drafted by intensive care specialist Greg Kelly, warning that more than 12,000 people in Australia would be infected with the virus by April 4, “on current growth rates.”
This letter warns that even more severe health crisis can only be prevented by “heeding the lessons of other countries.” That includes “immediately implementing the strict measures of lockdown and social distancing that have shown to be effective” and “preparing our health systems for a surge of COVID 19 and critically ill patients.”
In hospitals, the measures needed include “an immediate reduction in elective work, increased frequency and intensity of hospital cleaning, measures to temporarily increase intensive care capacity and increasing protective equipment for staff.”
With reported infections doubling every three to five days, there would “be 750 on Friday, 1,500 on Tuesday next week, 3,000 next Saturday, 6,000 on the 1st of April and 12,000 by the 4th of April,” the letter states.
Australia’s healthcare system would be “in a worse position than Italy” should the predictions come to fruition, the doctors warn.
The letter reports that doctors in the Lombardy region, which is the richest in Italy, with a health system equal to Australia’s, describe their situation as like being “in a war zone.”
They are “completely overwhelmed” and unable to “provide intensive care to previously healthy seventy-year-olds.”
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/03/19/doct-m19.htm