Level 37 1 William St Brisbane GPO Box 48 Brisbane Queensland 4000 Australia
Website health.qld.gov.au Email
ABN 66 329 169 412
Enquiries to: Kirsten Law Director Legislative Policy
Telephone: Our ref: CAPS2248
Ms Corrine McMillian MP Chair Community Support and Services Committee Parliament House George Street BRISBANE QLD 4000
Email: CSSC@parliament.qld.gov.au
Dear Ms McMillan
Thank you for the opportunity to respond to public submissions to the Community Support and Services Committee’s inquiry into the Public Health and Other Legislation (Extension of Expiring Provisions) Amendment Bill 2022.
Please find attached Queensland Health’s response to the public submissions. Given the large number of submissions received, Queensland Health has responded to the key themes and issues raised rather than responding to each individual submission.
Should you require further information, Queensland Health’s contact is Ms Kirsten Law,
Director, Legislative Policy Unit, on telephone or via email at
Yours sincerely
Shaun Drummond Acting Director-General
Encl.
Page 1
Community Support and Services Committee inquiry into the Public Health and
Other Legislation (Extension of Expiring Provisions) Amendment Bill 2022
Departmental response to issues raised in written submissions
The Community Support and Services Committee has published 1,000 public submissions as part of its Inquiry
into the Public Health and Other Legislation (Further Extension of Expiring Provisions) Amendment Bill 2022
(Bill). The Departmental response addresses the issues raised in the submissions numbered 1 to 1000, as
published by the Committee as at 5 pm on 10 March 2022.
Due to the large number of submissions received, Queensland Health has responded to the key themes and
issues raised rather than responding to each individual submission.
Public Health and Other Legislation (Extension of Expiring Provisions) Amendment Bill 2022
Page 9
Other issues raised A number of other issues were raised in submissions including:
• the temporary COVID-19 legislation is unconstitutional, breaches federal or international law, or sovereign citizen
rights;
• the restrictions cause mental health issues, economic loss, job loss and divide society;
• people do not consent to the restrictions and mandates;
• the government needs to listen to the community’s views;
• funding should be redirected to responding to extreme weather events, like the recent floods in Queensland; and
• restrictions are causing disintegration of trust in public institutions.
QLS called for the re-enlivening of the modified arrangements to allow wills and enduring documents to be witnessed
by electronic means rather than in person to ensure continuity of essential legal services until end of the COVID-19
public health emergency.
Strata Community Association QLD (SCA) encouraged the continuation of some of the temporary measures put in place to enable institutions and businesses to continue functioning during COVID-19 such as being able to conduct meetings and decision making in a remote manner as they have been essential to manage affairs during the pandemic. The Australian Logistics Council acknowledged the benefit of relaxing freight curfews and delivery restrictions during COVID-19 and made recommendations to consider implementing these measures permanently like in New South Wales. The Family Responsibilities Commission recommended the extension of the expiry of the Family Responsibilities Commission (COVID-19 Emergency Response) Regulation 2020 to 31 December 2022. QHRC noted that it was not consulted on the development of the Bill.
These comments are beyond the scope of the Bill as they relate to administrative or operational
details, potential program improvements, requirements in specific public health directions or
opportunities for future legislative or administrative reform.
The measures put in place in other legislation through the pandemic to provide regulatory relief
and ensure the continued operation of institutions and businesses are separate from the immediate
public health response and are not being amended or effected by this Bill. Rather, they will expire
in accordance with their existing expiry provisions set by the Parliament through earlier legislation.
As the Bill does not affect these other amendments, any issues in relation to these matters are
beyond the scope of the Bill.
Queensland Health notes that it was intended that QHRC be consulted on the development of the
Bill but this did not occur due to an administrative error.
5
the original COVID-19 strain the basic reproductive number has been estimated to be between 2-
3 (for the original strain) the emerging dominant variants—Alpha, Delta and Omicron—have been
successively more transmissible.
• This means that even if the IFR were the same for influenza and COVID-19, the number of deaths
in a population (mortality rate) are likely to be much higher for COVID-19 due to higher
transmission potential.
• There are reports that the IFR for the Omicron variant of concern is approaching that of influenza,
and lower than Delta due to improved treatments, high levels of vaccine and infection induced
immunity, and a possible intrinsic reduced virulence compared to Delta. However, at any point a
more virulent variant may emerge, or one that is immune evasive, or does not respond to
treatment.
• Waning vaccine effectiveness will also be an important potential driver in any changes in
transmission rates as Australia’s immunity is largely driven by vaccination.
Reporting and recording deaths by cause
• It is difficult to accurately capture deaths associated with influenza, and this is also the case with
COVID-19.
• COVID-19 deaths that are reported daily in Australia include all people that have died with COVID-
19.
• The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) codes deaths data provided by state and territory, data
is coded to the standardised International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related
Health Problems (ICD).
• Deaths are attributed to an underlying cause which is the disease or condition that initiated the
sequence of events leading to death. Most deaths also have associated causes, these are
conditions that contributed to the deaths but did not cause it.
• For surveillance purposes, a COVID-19 death is defined as a death in a confirmed COVID-19
case, unless there is a clear alternative cause of death that cannot be related to COVID-19 (e.g.
trauma). There should be no period of complete recovery from COVID-19 between illness and
death.