29th July 2020

Re: COVID-19 Update for Family and Friends – Urgent!

Dear Residents, Family and Friends,

Unfortunately as many of you will be aware already there has been confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the Logan area as of last night. This was first released via the press to us this morning and further information provided today by the Chief Health Officer Dr Jeanette Young. Dr Jeanette Young has issued a statement and I have included it below which outlines the situation and the information we have at present:

“It is very disappointing this has occurred. Two young women returned from Melbourne, which we know is an absolute hotspot with a lot of cases, returned from Melbourne on the 21 July via Sydney and now tested positive. As a result of that, a lot of people are going to be inconvenienced.

 And I do apologise to those people for what is now going to have to do occur. But we know that if we act really fast now we can stop this spreading fervour and cause even more inconvenience to a a lot of people. So there are going to be shopping centres, a school, restaurants to close now for at least 48 hours while we arrange a deep clean of those facilities and contact trace people who attended.

 And also, I have asked that all the aged care facilities in the Metro South area be closed to visitors and have enhanced screening of staff and that staff are not to work across multiple facilities. We need to act really, really fast. These two young women have been out in the community for eight days while unwell. So please, anyone who lives in that Logan, Acacia Ridge, Springfield Lakes, areas, if you have any symptoms at all or if you are concerned, please come forward immediately and get tested.

 There will be additional fever clinics put in place but please, see your own GP, go to one of the fever clinics that are there and get yourself tested as soon as possible. If you are unwell, stay at home and isolate yourself. That is the way we can all work together to stop this further spreading.”

As indicated in my communication just last week we have taken the view that if an outbreak was to occur and that outbreak occurred in our local government area or one adjacent to it that we would implement restrictions to access of our sites. Unfortunately this particular situation impacts two of our locations, Victoria Point and Melody Park, both of which are adjacent to the Logan area.

As such we regret to inform you that our sites will be closed to all non-essential persons for the next 48 hours until we are able to ascertain the extent of this potential outbreak. You will of course be able to continue using the video conferencing facilities we previously setup which can be booked via our administration office at each site. Further if your loved one is palliative please contact our local site and we will look at assisting you with making arrangements to assist you in maintaining visits through this time.

This also impacts you if you are one of our Supported Living clients receiving in home care. Whilst we have continued to call you prior to our visits to ensure that you were well we will be asking some additional questions including where you have been over the last 10 days. This will assist us in establishing whether there is any risk that you may have been in an area that has been identified today. It may be necessary for us to ask if we can delay delivering some of our services depending on your answers so if this impacts you please be patient as we work through the challenges that this initial period brings.

At present we are identifying all of our staff that live in the impacted area and we are implementing that it will be mandatory for these staff members to wear personal protective equipment whilst at work.

The screening of all persons entering into our residential aged care facilities continues and this of course includes our staff and we continue remind everyone that if they are unwell that they must not come to our sites until they are well / have been tested and it can be confirmed they do not have COVID-19.

We are truly sorry that this has eventuated however we are confident that the planning and preparation we have already put in place to respond to this situation will give us the best possible chance to keep all of those that we care for safe.

A further communication will be sent out on Friday once we have more information and the contact tracing that it currently underway has had an opportunity to begin to provide us with a clearer picture as to the extent of the community transmission that has occurred.

Thank you for your understanding and support.

Yours sincerely,

Eric Anderson

CEO