Federal Aged Care Minister Anika Wells says the government has come up with a plan to protect aged care residents from the COVID wave set to sweep the country.
This year, 2,141 aged care residents have died as a result of COVID-19, and as of yesterday, 819 aged care facilities were reporting outbreaks.
Ms Wells said while more residents were catching the virus, it was less deadly than previous outbreaks.
"Because of the number of cases nationally, because those statistics are just bigger across the board, it means that deaths in aged care are larger as well," she said.
"If you look at percentages, we had a 30 per cent — a horrific percentage in the first Victorian winter wave — of deaths in aged care due to COVID. Whereas deaths in care due to due to COVID now are only at sort of two to three per cent."
Earlier this week, Ms Wells met with chief medical officer Paul Kelly, deputy chief medical officer Michael Kidd, aged care commissioner Janet Anderson, and health secretary Brendan Murphy to come up with a plan to safeguard residents from the virus.
Key measures will include getting residents fourth vaccine doses and antiviral medications, a renewed push for infection control training, safety for workers and visitors, and proactive engagement with care facilities.
Ms Wells said fourth dose rates were already high.
"One of the first things I did was write to all the providers to urge them to do the fourth winter dose," she said.
"Since then, so about six weeks ago, we've had a 15 per cent rise in [vaccination] rates. Now we've got 70 per cent of our residents vaccinated with a fourth dose, which is a much higher rate than the country as a whole."
Antivirals will prevent repeat of summer crisis, say experts
Access to antiviral medication is also a key strategy to protect residents from serious illness, and the government says it has already sorted stockpiles.
"We have procured enough for aged care residential facilities, and we have along with additional PPE dispatched it ahead of this anticipated wave," Ms Wells said.
Interim chief executive of the Aged and Community Care Providers Association, Paul Sadler, said the additional protections were welcome.
"The big game changer from our point of view is that we have antiviral medications now available and distributed right around the country," he said.
The government is also urging the states and territories to keep mask mandates in place in aged care facilities.
Defence surge workforce to end
Six months after ADF personnel were deployed to prop up the aged care workforce, the extra support is set to end.
Around 1,700 defence force staff were sent into aged care homes by the Morrison government in February to provide clinical, general and logistical support for homes overwhelmed by the Omicron wave and suffering severe staffing shortages.
The Albanese government said that support is set to end on August 12.
"It was a decision of the former government and the new government is confirming the decision," Ms Wells said.
"The requirements for when people need to isolate and for how long have been significantly reduced." she said.
Mr Sadler said previous waves had wiped out the aged care workforce, and it was likely this winter would do the same.
"All the projections are that we will be seeing a peak of community transmission of Omicron due to the BA.4 and BA.5 variants, and that peak will be hit through late July and into August," he said.
"It could be that it's as widespread as it was back in January, and that could have a substantial impact on the availability of staff in aged care.
Mr Sadler said he could foresee a situation where defence support would need to be extended beyond the August 12 deadline.
"I think it may well be that this needs to be extended even beyond that. The ADF involvement does highlight the one area that we remain very concerned about, and that is the availability of staff," he said.
"I do think ADF support whatever other help we can get with workforce will be absolutely critical in the coming weeks."
Ms Wells said she would act on the medical advice.
"It is an option that remains available to us if that is what the medical advice coming from the CMO at that point in time is for us to do," she said.
The changes come as the government has proceeded with plans from its predecessor to end paid pandemic leave and funding for free rapid tests for low-income earners.
Ms Wells said it was not a case of making cuts but balancing competing interests in a budget deep in deficit.
"I understand that people think that it looks like we're cutting off health funding, when in fact it's expiring," she said.
"We've got to spend money elsewhere — like antivirals for example. That's not something we had access to last winter, but it's going to be so important to helping our aged care residents this winter."
