Is this the REAL reason for Melbourne’s migrant coronavirus spike? Government blunder is revealed after Daniel Andrews blamed Victorian families for outbreaks
- Company hired by Victorian government only spoke English to families
- It may have left thousands unaware of changes to COVID-19 lockdown rules
- Melbourne's latest outbreak is in areas with high numbers of immigrants
- In Hume and Brimbank more than 50 per cent of people speak other languages
- The government has since vowed to launch a campaign to cross cultural barriers
- Here’s how to help people impacted by Covid-19
A company hired by the Victorian government to speak to families about the dangers of the coronavirus only spoke English, despite outbreaks in Melbourne's migrant communities.
Insiders said a failure to tell households about social distancing and quarantine rules in any language other than English had been a 'blind spot'.
Melbourne has been plunged into crisis as residents began stockpiling toilet roll and queuing for hours to get COVID-19 tests in fear of a second wave of the virus.
Tuesday marked Victoria's 17th consecutive day of double-digit infections, after the rest of Australia brought the virus under control.
Another 17 cases were confirmed, prompting premier Daniel Andrews to tell people to stay home, blaming large families for the outbreak.
The six coronavirus hot spots in Melbourne (pictured) have high numbers of residents born overseas and those who do not speak English as a first language
But officials in charge of managing the crisis may have been unable to communicate with some families, particularly those in six coronavirus hot spots - which could now be forced into mandatory lockdown.
Part of health minister Jenny Mikakos' $37 million contact tracing programme, announced on April 4, was paying company Whispir to communicate with confirmed cases.
But sources have confirmed that Whispir only spoke to people in English before Monday.
Critics told the Financial Review the government has failed to communicate with multicultural communities, and were unable to engage with non-English speaking households.
Families have been blamed for spreading the coronavirus in hot spots such as Hume (pictured on Tuesday), where shoppers gathered to get supplies
A health worker is seen next cars queuing at a COVID-19 testing site at Craigieburn Health Service in Melbourne on Tuesday (pictured)
The coronavirus clusters have high numbers of foreign born households, and people who speak English as a second language.
Six districts face being put under mandatory lockdown after the unexpected spike, Hume and Brimbank, in Melbourne's north and west, Casey and Cardinia in the city's southeast and Moreland and Darebin in the north.
These areas have higher proportions of foreign-born families, as well as being less likely to speak English.
Other officials have blamed the mixed messages sent by the Black Lives Matter protests, as well as the restarting of football games.
'The communities have got mixed messages and it can be hard enough to understand even when you do speak English,' Ethnic Communities' Council of Victoria chairman Eddie Micallef said.
'One of the problems has been the complacency of the broader community and multicultural communities pick up that message.'
Indicating that not enough had been done to speak to multi-cultural communities, Ms Mikakos said the government was launching an engagement campaign.
A long queue of cars wait at a drive-through COVID-19 testing site located in a shopping centre car park in Melbourne on Tuesday (pictured)
Black Lives Matter protesters rally in Melbourne's CBD on June 6 (pictured) with four cases linked to it so far - with critics saying it gave out 'the wrong message' about distancing
'This is designed to make sure our public health message is reaching everyone in our state, and everyone is aware about risks and their obligations,' she said.
'We're going to focus on shopping centres and train stations as well, and … there will be doorknocking and there will be roundtables with multicultural communities in hot spot areas.'
In Brimbank, 47.9 per cent of people are born outside of Australia, with 58.4 per cent of people speaking languages other than English.
The area's average wage is just $44,455, compared to $48,360 nationally.
In neighbouring Hume, nearly 30,000 residents speak either Turkish or Arabic and 35.7 per cent of people were born overseas.
Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews (pictured on Tuesday) warned sick people against leaving their homes, saying just one person pretending everything is okay could infect many others
Darebin also has a high immigrant population, with 33.3 per cent born overseas, as does Casey with 38.2 per cent.
In Moreland, it's 34 per cent but in Cardinia it's 19 per cent, which is less than the national average.
Mr Andrews said a legion of health officials will be sent out on Wednesday to speak to families on their doorstep, with a focus on breaking language and cultural barriers.
'We had low-level chains of community transmission that we were not necessarily aware of,' Mr Andrews told reporters on Tuesday.
Medical workers on Tuesday staffed a drive-through COVID-19 testing site located in a shopping centre car park in Melbourne (pictured)
Marketing analyst Eliza Honan (pictured) had been holidaying in Aspen in early March when she caught coronavirus, but the disease is now spreading through less affluent communities
'It is principally families, larger families often, making decisions that are not in accordance with the rules and are not the right thing to do.
'Since June, about half of our new cases, the transmission of the virus can be traced back to families.'
The state's chief health officer, Brett Sutton, agreed.
'We have made great progress in slowing the spread of coronavirus, but we are still seeing transmission in households and other settings,' he said on Monday.
'We've had more than 120 new cases in the past seven days.
'And the main cause for this increase has been through cases in families — where people have not followed our advice around physical distancing, hygiene and limiting the number of people you invite into your home.'
Two schools, Brunswick East Primary School and Keilor Views Primary School, have closed after students tested positive.
There are now 131 active cases in Victoria, after the number dropped to just 50 a fortnight ago.
'There’s a possibility of tighter lockdowns, as we did in north-west Tasmania, on the table, and I think it’s very important to be honest about that,' health minister Greg Hunt said on Tuesday.
So far during the pandemic, middle-class and well travelled Australians have been among the most infected, generally picking up the virus abroad on holiday.
This includes the roughly 600 people who became infected aboard the Ruby Princess cruise ship in March, as well as a cluster of well-heeled travellers who picked up the virus while skiing in Colorado.
But this unique trend is not the same overseas, where the most hard hit are lower socio-economic grounds, often including immigrants and people of colour.
In the UK, ethnic minorities are dying from COVID-19 at a disproportionately higher rate compared to white people.
The same is evident in the United States, where in New York City black patients are nearly twice as likely to die from coronavirus as white people.
A customer leaves Coles supermarket with toilet paper at Brimbank shopping centre on Tuesday (pictured)
Among African American people, there are 92.3 deaths per 100,000 people, compared to 45.2 for white people.
Islamic Council of Victoria vice-president Adel Salman said while he believed people were 'aware of the advice' and health information was being widely spread, he agreed the new surge in infections is the result of eased lockdown measures.
'I think that creates confusion,' Mr Salman said.
Ethnic Communities Council of Victoria chairman Eddie Micallef expressed concerns that poor health literacy has exacerbated the latest outbreak.
He believes it's the result of confusing messaging and general community complacency as lockdown restrictions eased in recent weeks.
'I think there was a little bit of complacency,' Mr Micallef told The Australian.
'I think the message started to get lost.'
Cars are seen queuing up outside a COVID-19 testing site at Highpoint Shopping Centre in Melbourne (pictured) on Tuesday
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMidGh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmRhaWx5bWFpbC5jby51ay9uZXdzL2FydGljbGUtODQ1MjgwNy9PdXRicmVha3MtTWVsYm91cm5lcy1taWdyYW50LWNvbW11bml0aWVzLWxhY2stRW5nbGlzaC1zcGVha2luZy5odG1s0gF4aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZGFpbHltYWlsLmNvLnVrL25ld3MvYXJ0aWNsZS04NDUyODA3L2FtcC9PdXRicmVha3MtTWVsYm91cm5lcy1taWdyYW50LWNvbW11bml0aWVzLWxhY2stRW5nbGlzaC1zcGVha2luZy5odG1s?oc=5
2020-06-24 10:09:21Z
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