July 7, 2022
  • Homepage
  • Social Justice & Action
  • Climate Change and Environment
  • Community Campaigns
  • Member Stories
  • Home
    • Latest News
    • Featured News
    • Editorial
    • Lamp Archive
    • Lamp 2022
  • Professional Issues
    • Research
    • Education
    • Career
    • Registration
    • Students
    • Public Health
  • Specialities
    • Mental Health
    • Aged Care
    • Midwifery
    • Emergency
    • Drug and Alcohol
    • General
  • Workplace Issues
    • Ask Shaye
    • Workplace News
    • Unions
  • Social Justice & Action
    • Climate Change and Environment
    • Community Campaigns
    • Member Stories
    • Share Your Story
  • Life
    • Work
    • Offers
    • Travel
  • Conferences, Scholarships & Research
    • Jobs

Top Advertisment

Member Stories

Social Justice & Action / Member Stories

Perrotet is culpable for ‘Let it rip’

Lamp Editorial Team
|
April 7, 2022

As an emergency nurse, I was convinced we would have been pretty prepared and ready to “open up” in December.

It was not like the government didn’t have two years to plan for it, and we have seen the massive impacts of COVID-19 across other countries’ health systems. How were we not able to prevent this?

Premier Perrottet’s “Let It Rip” strategy was a massive failure and an act of neglect against the people of NSW and the NSW health system.

To defy and dismiss health advice regarding masks just weeks before Christmas must be considered criminal. In the last weeks of December and first week of January, our unit lost one out of five nurses to COVID, and within a matter of days we had huge skilled staffing shortages in Emergency.

It was correctly predicted that we would see close to 180–200 presentations a day over this period – our normal is about 120 – but to try to handle that amount of extra patients with casuals, unorientated staff and working short in the highest acuity unit in the hospital was extremely exhausting.

COVID has made everything so much harder. COVID-positive patients with dementia and delirium coming from nursing homes into our ED are difficult to manage. We have had orthopaedic patients with serious lacerations have treatment or operations delayed for hours because they were COVID-positive.

Our bed block has become overwhelming due to COVID – and that’s not because of patients infected; it’s because staff are. Large parts of the hospital cannot open beds due to unsafe staffing levels. A “capacity crisis” is called every day but nothing changes. On most morning shifts, we are lucky to be allocated one bed in the entire hospital after people have been stuck in ED for over 60 hours.

ED overcrowding kills. I am sick of it because it is preventable.

The failures to predict, or just act on the idea that people would swamp testing centres immediately after letting COVID run free in the community, just shows incompetence. I feel sympathy for my managers for not being given resources to fend off this tide of admissions. What a nightmare!

The staff on the floor have the solutions to this mess, and we should be respected and listened to. Premier Perrottet needs to go. #letitripfailed.

Ben Landsdowne, RN

Related Posts

NSW nurse practitioner takes out Nurse of the Year award 

1 year ago

Julie Page: our July Nurse of the Month

1 year ago

Christopher Patterson: our June nurse of the month

2 years ago

Middle Advertisment

Share This Story, Choose Your Platform!

Reader Interactions

Cancel reply

Advertisement Area Single Article

COVID-19 Information

  • Public health employees
  • Private health employees
  • Aged Care information
  • Student information
  • Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)

Trending

  • Moral injury: what happens when exhausted health workers can no longer provide the care they want for their patients under Career
  • Tax time tips for nurses and midwives under Work
  • Public health employee information for COVID-19 under COVID-19, Public Health
  • Didn’t get a new grad offer? Here’s what you can do! under Students
  • COVID-19 Updates and Guidelines under COVID-19, Private Sector, Public Health

Footer Content 01





Footer Content 02

The Lamp is the magazine of the NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association. It is published bi-monthly and mailed to every member of the Association.

Footer Menu 01

About

NSWNMA
Careers
Terms of Use
Privacy Policy

Footer Menu 02

Contact

Contact Us

Footer Menu 03

Advertising

Advertising

Copyright © 2022 NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association. Authorised by B.Holmes, General Secretary, NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association, 50 O’Dea Avenue Waterloo NSW 2017 Australia.
Design and Development by Slant Agency