Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) expresses grave concern about the outbreak of the Ebola virus in, and its impact on, West Africa, in particular Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone, and beyond;

(2) recognises that the peacebuilding and development gains of the most affected countries concerned could be reversed in light of the Ebola outbreak, underlining that the outbreak is undermining the stability of the most affected countries concerned and, unless contained, may lead to further instances of civil unrest, social tensions and a deterioration of the political and security climate;

(3) determines that the unprecedented extent of the Ebola outbreak in Africa constitutes a threat to international peace and security;

(4) expresses concern about the particular impact of the Ebola outbreak on women;

(5) takes note of the:

(a) measures taken by United Nations Member States of the region, especially Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone, as well as Nigeria, Côte d'Ivoire and Senegal, in response to the Ebola outbreak, and recognises that the outbreak may exceed the capacity of the governments concerned to respond; and

(b) letter dated 29 August 2014 to the United Nations Secretary-General from the presidents of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, requesting a comprehensive response to the Ebola outbreak, including a coordinated international response to end the outbreak and to support the societies and economies affected by restrictions on trade and transportation during the outbreak;

(6) emphasises the:

(a) key role of United Nations Member States, including through the Global Health Security Agenda where applicable, to provide adequate public health services to detect, prevent, respond to and mitigate outbreaks of major infectious diseases through sustainable, well-functioning and responsive public health mechanisms; and

(b) control of outbreaks of major infectious diseases requires urgent action and greater national, regional and international collaboration, stressing the crucial and immediate need for a coordinated international response to the Ebola outbreak;

(7) expresses:

(a) deep appreciation to the first-line responders to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, including national and international health and humanitarian relief workers contributed by the Member States of diverse regions and non-governmental organisations such as Médecins Sans Frontières and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies; and

(b) appreciation of the United Nations Humanitarian Air Service for transporting humanitarian personnel and medical supplies and equipment, especially to remote locations in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, during the outbreak;

(8) takes note of the:

(a) WHO Ebola Response Roadmap of 28 August 2014 that aims to stop transmission of the Ebola virus disease worldwide, while managing the consequences of any further international spread; and

(b) 12 Mission Critical Actions, including infection control, community mobilisation and recovery, to resolve the Ebola outbreak; and

(9) notes the United Nations call that Member States:

(a) facilitate the delivery of assistance, including qualified, specialised and trained personnel to contain the outbreak to the affected countries and, expresses deep appreciation to the Government of Ghana for allowing the resumption of the air shuttle of United Nations Mission in Liberia from Monrovia to Accra, which will transport international health workers and other responders to areas affected by the Ebola outbreak in Liberia;

(b) provide urgent resources and assistance, including deployable medical capabilities such as field hospitals with qualified and sufficient expertise, staff and supplies, laboratory services, logistical, transport and construction support capabilities, airlift and other aviation support and aeromedical services and dedicated clinical services in Ebola treatment units and isolation units, to support the affected countries in intensifying preventive and response activities and strengthening national capacities in response to the Ebola outbreak, and to allot adequate capacity to prevent future outbreaks;

(c) mobilise and provide immediate technical expertise and additional medical capacity, including for rapid diagnosis and training of health workers at the national and international level, to the affected countries, and those providing assistance to the affected countries and to continue to exchange expertise, lessons learned and best practices;

(d) maximise synergies to respond effectively and immediately to the Ebola outbreak, provide essential resources, supplies and coordinated assistance to the affected countries and implementing partners, and encourage all relevant actors to cooperate closely with the Secretary-General on response assistance efforts; and

(e) commend the continued contribution and commitment of international health and humanitarian relief workers to respond urgently to the Ebola outbreak and seek all relevant actors to put in place the necessary repatriation and financial arrangements, including medical evacuation capacities and treatment and transport provisions, to facilitate their immediate and unhindered deployment to the affected countries.

I move this motion today because the window to tackle the Ebola crisis is closing fast and unless Australia joins the international community in attacking it at its source in West Africa, the opportunity to contain this outbreak may be lost forever.

A fortnight ago the United Nations warned we had just 60 days to bring Ebola under control, or face what it called an 'unprecedented situation for which we do not have a plan'. The number of cases now exceeds 10,000 and the number of fatalities 5,000. In just the last few days we have seen Ebola spread into a sixth West African country, Mali, and a doctor confirmed in New York as the second confirmed case of Ebola in the United States.

The way that we protect Australians from Ebola is not by waiting for it to appear in our region but by fighting it in West Africa, as a public letter earlier this month by 60 Australian health professions made clear:

We are all stakeholders in this epidemic and it is in our urgent national interest to contribute to the response with deployment of skilled personnel.

Let me repeat that point: 'our urgent national interest'. If we wait until Ebola reaches our region, many of our neighbours will find their health systems overwhelmed and, as the World Health Organisation has said, the consequences could be huge.

That is why, for well over a month now, Labor has been arguing that Australia should facilitate sending some of our world-leading health professionals to join the international effort to tackle the Ebola outbreak. Our call has been echoed by the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the UN Security Council, Medecins Sans Frontieres, the International Crisis Group, the President of Sierra Leone, Oxfam, the Australian Medical Association and the Public Health Association of Australia. And it follows calls from the UK and the US governments. Indeed, six weeks ago the Abbott government co-sponsored a UN Security Council resolution which called on the world:

… to facilitate the delivery of assistance, including qualified, specialized and trained personnel and supplies, in response to the Ebola outbreak …

In fact, the motion that I have moved today uses exactly the words of the UN resolution.

It is unfathomable to me that Australia could recognise the risk, identify the solution, stand with the rest of the world in supporting this and then do so very little. The government has argued that Australia could not join with the international community in sending health personnel and other resources because Africa is too far away. This has always been a red herring. No-one—not Labor, not the AMA, not the aid agencies—has ever suggested that any of our aid workers who fall ill should ever be placed in the circumstances where they would be getting the best medical care by having a 30-hour flight back to Australia. And everyone agrees that, if we do send any Australians into West Africa, we need to ensure that they have access to decent care and treatment should they contract Ebola. What is now clear is that such arrangements can be negotiated when we have a government with the will and commitment to achieving this.

Australia has nothing but the highest regard for our health workers and the officials working to plan Australia's response should Ebola arrive in our region. But the best way for Australia to ensure that this does not happen is to join with our friends and allies in sending expert personnel to contain this outbreak at its source If we do this, we know we can succeed. This is not a hopeless cause. The way we can contain Ebola is well understood and, given adequate resources, it is possible to quickly achieve.

Many of you will have seen the dire warnings from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that, if the Ebola outbreak is not contained, the number of cases could exceed a million by January. But that same report has also forecast that, if the international community quickly tackled the crisis by sending health workers and resources to the region, the Ebola epidemic would be contained by January. I do not think that anyone in this parliament wants to look back in January and think that we could have acted as a country to engage with the international community on what is an unprecedented crisis and that we stood by and did nothing.

Australia is rightly respected for our generous and rapid response to humanitarian crises around the world. It is time we lived up to our reputation and joined our friends and allies in fighting the Ebola crisis in West Africa. It is not only the right thing for Australia to do in the face of such a humanitarian crisis; it is also indisputably in the best interests of Australia that we act. We know we can save lives. We know, that through our efforts internationally and with the international community we can shut the Ebola crisis down in West Africa. It is well past time that the Australian government acted.

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