A new report has revealed that Australia’s elective surgery numbers fell to the lowest level since 2010 and nearly 40 percent of patients were forced to wait more than four hours in an emergency department due to COVID-19. Adrian Webster, a spokesperson for the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW), said that public hospitals…

Elective surgeries have been deferred at some of Melbourne’s largest hospitals as staff shortages put pressure on already busy services. The Alfred has paused elective surgeries for a week because a high number of key clinical staff are off sick due to COVID-19. AAP has been told it’s the hospital’s highest level of staff sick…

The Australian Medical Association and the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS) are urging the government to immediately address the “growing and increasingly critical” backlog of elective surgeries, pushed back due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The call comes as the new Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) data shows Australia are waiting longer than…

Australia’s private hospitals are essential to address the surge of essential elective surgery when restrictions ease, a peak industry body has said. The number of patients on Australia’s public hospital elective surgery waiting lists increased during 2020–21 as hospitals dealt with a backlog caused by COVID-19 in the previous year. “To ensure the health system…

Australians may have their elective surgeries cancelled in the state of New South Wales (NSW) as hospitals struggle to cope with COVID-19 hospitalisations. NSW Health Deputy Secretary Susan Pearce on Friday said that whether the government will turn non-urgent elective surgeries back on in NSW is “highly dependent with what happens with respect to hospitalisations.”…

Elective surgery has returned to full capacity for public and private hospital patients in Greater Sydney as of Monday, according to NSW Health. This comes after a 75 percent cap on overnight non-urgent elective surgery had been in place in response to the outbreak of the delta variant of the CCP virus. NSW Health said…

Commentary It seems the “shut up and mask” wall is finally crumbling on COVID. The usual suspects still say you need to cover up and quarantine outdoors after getting vaccinated. But it’s becoming reputable to ask questions that, frankly, ought to have been asked long ago. For instance, a long and worrying discussion in the…