Should I download the COVIDSafe App?

To answer this question, it’s important to understand the state of affairs in Australia right now. Things are definitely looking brighter, even in the most populous city, Sydney. Restrictions are slowly being lifted, broadening our sense of hope.

At the same time, it may increase apprehensions in some that we are lifting COVID-19 restrictions too early. Scenes of Bondi two months ago and fears of second waves of the coronavirus spreading that have plagued jurisdictions in other parts of the world are valid reasons for continuing lockdown.

For some, it may be reasonable to suspect that some Australians may not play by the rules but recent history should suggest that Australians on the whole have done a remarkable job with infection rates coming down dramatically.

What is BJC doing?

At BJC, we too have been wondering what our next steps should be. Over the past 9 weeks, our group of leaders have met on a daily basis, even weekends. We’ve had countless directors’ meetings to help make decisions about patient and staff safety.

For those patients and team members who have had to come into our clinics, strict social distancing, hygiene and preventative measures have been in place since February. We are still recommending that many of our patients use telehealth to consult with their practitioners.

This is the safest way by far. We’ve also had many of our clients exercise with us virtually which has been a great success.  However, we are human after all and we crave interaction, favourably physical in nature. As a medical centre, we have been allowed to remain open through this crisis, being deemed an essential service.

We have chosen to physically see patients who have really needed to come in if care could not be provided through telehealth mediums. We appreciate that as government restrictions ease, people will start having more confidence to venture outside their homes and come in to utilise our services as they have done so before.

We will continue to ask those who are in the more vulnerable category to still have online consultations - this is still the advice of the Department of Health. For those who are at a lesser risk and are wanting to return, we would like to welcome you back.

What about the COVIDSafe App and what does it mean for BJC?

When the federal government launched the COVIDSafe Application a few weeks ago, our directors had to consider our position, taking into account the implications on privacy and whether the app itself would achieve what the government was suggesting it would do.

Over the ensuing days and weeks, we have read and filtered through numerous reports plus spoken and heard from security and IT experts who have a better grasp of the technology and privacy concerns than we do. From a staff safety perspective, we have encouraged our entire team to download the app. Apart from keeping their colleagues safe whom they interact with when at work, we hope that having the COVIDSafe app downloaded on their smartphones and turned on in the background will keep them safe when they are not at work.

The premise of having the app is that it will record any close contact between others who also have the app downloaded and turned on. This data will only be accessed if there are reasons to do so and with the permission of the individual. From my understanding, if someone was to test positive to COVID-19, health authorities would request access to the recorded data to help with contact tracing thus being able to identify people who have been in close contact with the individual who has tested positive.

The ability to do this would hasten the manual process that is being used at the moment allowing for much quicker contact tracing and thus having more confidence that restrictions can further ease due to the ability to isolate cases at an increased rate.

COVIDSafe App Recommendation

For the same reasons given above, we are recommending that any patient coming into our clinics to also download the COVIDSafe app onto their smartphones. We feel this will help keep you, our team and the general community safer.

Close contact interactions with the practitioner you are with will be logged. For nearly all of us, this data will never need to be accessed but on the slight chance that someone has tested positive to the coronavirus or come in close contact with someone who has, the app should allow health authorities to isolate cases so much quicker with the aim to prevent clusters of cases.

Privacy concerns with the COVIDSafe App

We do also appreciate the privacy concerns with downloading such applications but when we consider those of us who use any of Google’s products like maps or dabble with facebook, whatsapp, twitter, Instagram or do the occasional dance on tiktok, these companies already hold so much data on us.

Downloading the COVIDSafe app seems like the right thing to do at this point in time. In recent days, reports have also suggested significant improvements with how well the application works.

I, like many can be the greatest of critics but I realise how hard it is for all governments at the moment and how difficult it is to please everyone they serve. However, I am grateful to be living through this COVID-19 crisis in Australia compared to many other places around the world. The COVIDSafe App seems like a great tool to keep us safe and allow more restrictions to be eased. Please continue to stay safe yourself and we look forward to continue serving you.

If you have any comments or queries, please feel free to let me know.

Errol Lim

 

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Restricting medical care to traditional in-clinic consultation is so 20th century!

Like most rheumatologists, the doctors at BJC Health have fixed session...

Read More

How our Rheumatology service might look after 6 months of the Covid-19 pandemic

On the 5th March, our team of BJC Health leaders met in my living room to...

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