Wurli-Wurlinjang Health Service is a Community Controlled Aboriginal Medical Service located in the top end of the NT in Katherine. Its CEO, Suzi Berto has identified transportation and a lack of isolation accommodation as key factors preventing their clients from getting tested for COVID-19.
“When our clients go to the swabbing station they’re getting told they need to go home and isolate. That’s pretty hard for them with all the overcrowding issues we’ve got here in Katherine, they don’t want to go home,” Suzi Berto said.
In the meantime, staff have spent hours on the phone looking for accommodation with limited success. And, the health service is reduced to only provide a limited number of services as it has been identified as an exposure site with the situation affecting not only the organizations’ premises but also its personnel.
I think if we extended a request to the NT government they’ll most certainly give us whatever support we need
“We had to close to get some deep-cleaning and fumigation done in our two sites. Most of our staff have been affected, and they’ve got to go into quarantine for 14 days. If they’ve been infected, well… who knows. Our numbers are down considerably.”
Wurli-Wurlinjang has called members of its workforce who haven’t been in the affected areas back to work, though it is forced to only deliver a limited number of services.
With their operations reduced, some of their workers have leveraged on their very good knowledge of their client-base to assist contact tracing teams investigating venues where check-ins alone had failed to identify everyone.
“Some of our staff have gone out to help contact tracing efforts, identifying some of our clients that they’ve captured on CCTV from the exposure sites.”
It’s hoped that workers’ familiarity with clients will help contact-tracers develop a better understanding of the outbreak in Katherine and reach out to people who might not even know they may have been exposed to the virus.
Suzi Berto says Wurli-Wurlinjang Health Service’s next steps depend on how case numbers unfold. “At the moment we’re told there are only 19 cases in the Territory and that they’re all in Howard Springs [National Resilience Centre]. So, we’ll be waiting on the Chief Minister’s update and see what happens from there.”
“I think if we extended a request to the NT government they’ll most certainly give us whatever support we need.”
“At the moment we’re coping, and today will be a lesson learnt in how we go forward. We’ll sit down at the end of the afternoon and assess the situation and see where we go from here.”