Australia is Establishing Their Very Own CDC to Unify Approaches to Animal, Plant, and Human Health and Pandemic Preparedness!

Public consultation apparently already took place (without the public being aware). Australian CDC Page and Consultant Report are both linked.

It is not only the Philippines that is rushing to set up its own CDC, Australia is doing the same.

Sharing this information and the interpretation of my friend Michelle Stubbs, who has been working tracking the Australian DAEN, TGA reports and other Government Covid Related efforts.

“The Australian Government provided a total of $3.2 million in the October 2022-23 Budget for the preparations to establish an Australian CDC. In November and December 2022, we invited select stakeholders to join a targeted consultation process exploring the roles and responsibilities of an Australian CDC. This included:

• workshops held in each capital city

• a virtual workshop

• written responses to the CDC consultation paper.

Following this consultation, we released the independently prepared CDC stakeholder consultation report. The report summarises stakeholder feedback from both written submissions to the CDC Consultation Paper and workshop participation. This feedback will inform the initial advice to government on the scope and functions of an Australian CDC.”

Link to the Australian CDC page.

The consultation report is available here for downloading. It also appears that the concerned public were not made aware of any such consultation. It is unclear whether further concerned public stakeholder input will be sought.

The following is summarized from the CDC stakeholder consultation report:

• The word trust is mentioned 20 times!

• The words ‘One Health’ are mentioned 18 times!

• And the words ‘climate change’ are mentioned 7 times! Yes, climate change!

After the last 3 years they actually think they are going to be trusted...Or is it that they realise that the issue of trust is where they need to do the most work?

Some snippets from the report...

• “Over the past three years, Australia has endured numerous public health emergencies: widespread and intense smoke inhalation from the 2019 and 2020 bushfires, the COVID-19 pandemic, and Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV).” What? I must have missed the Japanese encephalitis emergency.

• “This report provides a high-level summary of the 144 written submissions received from stakeholders across a range of advocacy groups, committees, industry representatives, medical colleges, NGOs, peak bodies, consultancies, research institutions/groups, unions and universities. These stakeholders specialise in a range of areas, including animal health, chronic/preventative health, communicable diseases, community health, environmental health, injury, medical and priority populations (including, but not limited to, First Nations peoples, people with disability, LGBTIQ+, CALD, migrants and refugees and people living with HIV). The diverse range of experts presented a spectrum of views, advice and experiences in public health.”

• “There is a strong expectation that the establishment of a CDC will drive much greater linkage and collaboration across the Australian health system and offer a genuine ‘one source of truth’ on how Australia responds to both communicable and non-communicable disease challenges into the future.”

One source of truth! Quite like the US CDC! New Zealand also specialized in one single source of truth!

• “In times of pandemics, many supported the CDC having a much more significant command and control role to ensure that decisions and actions were taken on the best available science and evidence (including directly commissioning its own research as needed, where gaps exist). This would drive consistency in both actions and messaging to foster community trust and buy-in (much of which was missing during the fragmented response to COVID-19).”

Emphasis on ‘command and control’...

• “Several peak bodies and community-based organisations also commented that many parts of our health system are working well in delivering positive health outcomes for their clients, stakeholders or local communities.”

A well-functioning health system appears not to be true! There are already waits of months to years to access health services, let alone to see positive outcomes! Services are provided by gagged and demoralized health care providers who must follow and parrot government dictates or else risk losing their jobs. Health care providers who are struggling with their own health in a spread far too thin, now grossly overloaded, and underfunded system.

• “Many stakeholders indicated that a genuine ‘One Health’ approach would require a significant elevation of animal and environmental health stakeholders and data sources to genuinely come to fruition (with a perception these stakeholders have often been seen as the ‘poor cousins’ to human and clinical health surveillance and analysis). With zoonoses comprising a large percentage of new and existing diseases in humans, it was commonly argued that an effective CDC needs very strong surveillance linkages with the veterinarian and environmental sectors. Many raised the example of Japanese Encephalitis as strong evidence for the need of a One Health approach to health care.”

Again with the JE emergency...When did that happen?

• “Many stakeholders also noted that the impacts of climate change mean that environmental health (and the impacts of environmental change) is going to be increasingly important as we face increases in the incidence of natural disasters, such as floods and bushfires.”

• “The CDC was envisioned to include core discipline experts including epidemiologists, statisticians, public health practitioners, infectious disease physicians, virologists, occupational health scientists, behavioural scientists, communication experts, and bioethicists.”

Bioethicists, lol...Where the hell were they over the last 3 years?

• “It was noted that the CDC ultimately needs to create an environment where stakeholders will want to voluntarily and routinely share data, rather than being coerced/forced to share information and data. This will be facilitated by a sound set of protocols underpinning data sharing/access and for the CDC to be open and transparent in its analysis and interpretation practices.”

I can see the CDC being as transparent as the TGA... which is NOT AT ALL!

On covid:

• “Jurisdictions took differing approaches to pandemic response at times – often base their critical decisions on different data sets or evidence. This had the effect of a patchwork of data and inter-jurisdictional comparisons that severely undermine public confidence and in turn compliance with public health messaging.”

I think it was more than mixed messages that undermined public confidence...

What they think worked well during covid:

• “Modelling to support decision making and forecasting was critical to the pandemic response and should prove more of a focus going forward for the CDC.”

WOW! Modelling worked? It was consistently wrong.

• “Novel methods of investigation and response, such as QR codes, patient administered tests, and self-reported data were very helpful. These tools and others could be used more widely for other infectious diseases.”

Of course they want more of this...

• “Being independent of political influences and underpinned by robust data, there is scope for it to propose evidence-based policies that both optimize, and make explicit, the trade-offs between social disruption and disease control.”

Completely unrealistic...Any agency funded by government cannot be independent...

• “A CDC offers critical scope to be a trusted, independent single source of truth – critical in pandemic times but equally important in rigorously assessing what works and what doesn’t to guide decisions on research investment and public health funding decisions.”

That terrifying term again “single source of truth”. That is the same as THE $CIENCE!

On data barriers:

• “One stakeholder mentioned the important role of AI for real-time data, analysis and disease detection. However, local communities, who were seen as vital data collectors, were also believed to be most distrustful of AI. To ensure rapid data collection and analysis, trust in AI at the local level needs to be developed.”

They are set to attempt to build trust in AI...That will be interesting...

• “Importantly, stakeholders noted that the data system utilised by the CDC should be able to maintain the utmost security of data but also enable easy access for approved parties to boost both collaboration and trust in the institution. Approved parties should come from a wide range of areas, including all levels of government and agencies, but also allow limited access for external organisations and researchers. University and researcher stakeholders were particularly eager for data access.”

‘Approved parties’ get access to the data...No mention of the public having access...