Dear colleagues,

This morning the Premier and Chief Health Officer announced changes to restrictions. The three-day lockdown for Greater Brisbane region will end at 6pm tonight, but with alternate restrictions in place until 1am Thursday 22 January.

Please remember that until 6pm today the lockdown restrictions apply.  

Restrictions from 6pm tonight until 1am 22 January

Face masks must be worn in indoor spaces, except your home, including:

• shopping centres, supermarkets, retail outlets and indoor markets
• hospitals and aged care facilities
• churches and places of worship
• libraries
• indoor recreational facilities and gyms
• indoor workplaces (where you can’t socially distance)
• public transport, taxis and rideshare
• airports and travelling on planes.

You must carry a face mask with you at all times when you leave home. You must wear it when it’s not possible to have 1.5m between you and other people.

Stay up to date with restrictions on the Queensland Health website.

PPE at work

Although we are at Tier 1 of our COVID response plan, we are working under the ‘Moderate Risk’ PPE requirements as set down by the Chief Health Officer. This is in addition to the restrictions for all personnel within the Greater Brisbane region as above.

This means, staff in clinical areas must wear the appropriate level of PPE for the type of care they are delivering.

Staff in non-clinical areas who can reliably stay 1.5m away from others do not need to wear a mask at their desks. If you are in a work area where you cannot physically distance from others, you will need to wear a mask at all times.

All staff must wear surgical masks when in common areas, such as tea rooms and elevators, and when moving around outside on campus and in walkways. When in doubt, wear a mask!

These masks must be Queensland Health supplied. Staff that arrive in their own masks may change their mask on arrival to a Metro North facility.

For full PPE requirements, refer to PPE Escalation document – “Moderate risk”.

Working from home

There has been a lot of questions about working from home arrangements over the next 10 days.

As Metro North staff are essential workers, regardless of your role, we expect that you attend your workplace as per your usual arrangements.

Hospital visitors

Under the current direction, visitors are not allowed at our facilities, including hospitals and residential aged and disability care facilities. The following exceptions are in place, with approval from the relevant Directorate Executive Director / Nurse Unit Manager:

• Patients under the age of 18;
• Patients with a disability and the person visiting is the carer of the patient;
• Patients in labour/pregnancy care;
• End-of-life support.

Concierge services will continue to ensure we can manage visitors efficiently and effectively.

Students

Students can now return to the workplace in line with physical distancing and appropriate PPE requirements.

Vaccination update

Metro North has been nominated as one of the Queensland hubs to administer the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. Once we’re ready to start vaccination, the vaccination hub will be on Level 5 of STARS in the rehabilitation ward on the western side. We are advised the vaccine may be available as early as mid-February.

Work is underway to determine who will receive the vaccine in the first round, as well as workflows and requirements for workforce, digital solutions and equipment. Immunisation Practice Nurses who wish to work in the Pfizer Vaccination Hub should contact Kim Ta, Project Officer COVID-19 Vaccination Program via their EOC to express their interest.

Thank you all for your work over the past few days and your compliance with the lockdown and restrictions. As ever, things are subject to rapid changes. Please keep alert, stay flexible and diligent in your physical distancing, handwashing and PPE use.

Regards,

Dr Liz Rushbrook
Metro North Incident Commander

Current MN Response Tier Activated – Tier 1

Metro North HHS – overview of Cases*

HHS	Patients being managed by HHS						FEVER Clinics
	Total In-patients			Virtual Ward / HITH / or similar	Deaths **	Total cases managed by HHS (including recovered) ***	# of clinics	Presentations
		ICU Pts
		ICU-NOT Ventilated	ICU-Ventilated					Last 24 hrs	TOTAL^
MN TOTAL	9	0	0	0	3	409	4	1111	130,429

*With effect 1 January 2021, 1000
**Metro North has three recorded deaths (one person a return traveller into NSW, who passed away in NSW)
*** These numbers reflect the cases being managed by Metro North.