• 18th Mar 2020

Board Brief - COVID-19

The Board of the Australasian College of Paramedicine held a teleconference meeting on Monday 16th March 2020.

The Board discussed in detail the evolving COVID-19 situation. Based on the assessment of the current status of COVID-19 in Australia and New Zealand, the College has decided to proactively manage our activities to minimise the likelihood of Coronavirus spreading from person-to-person at one of our events.

The Board acknowledges that COVID-19 is going to place extreme pressure on our health care systems and as health professionals, there is an increased risk of exposure to the virus for paramedics. As paramedics have daily contact with at-risk members of our community, it is imperative we do all we can to ensure we are not a source of transmission of Coronavirus. Therefore, having a large number of paramedics in close contact at our events is likely to have an impact on the provision of healthcare going forward if one or more attendees were to have unknowingly attended whilst infected. Whilst the risk is low, attending events does increase that risk.

The Board has decided to postpone or move online all current planned in-person events and to put on hold the organisation and delivery of further in-person events until the COVID-19 situation stabilises.

The Board has asked the College staff to focus on the online delivery of events and activities to meet the edcuational needs of members.

College Events
The following conferences have been postponed until 2021:
• Trauma on the Border conference
• Rural, Outback and Remote conference

The College education team are working with venues to re-schedule with new dates available by the end of March. We are also investigating the delivery of some of the presentations from Trauma on the Border as an online event.

The following upcoming events will be postponed or moved to online events:
• Paediatric Burns, Brisbane – 26 March
• TAS Journal Club, Hobart – 30 March
• Case review sessions, Hobart – 7 April

Online Learning
The College Event staff are working with our member committees and event organisers to pull together a program of regular live online workshops to commence from mid-April.

Changes to this advice
The Board acknowledges that the situation with COVID-19 is rapidly changing and we will continue to monitor and follow the advice of governments.

Sources of Information for members
• Australian Government Health site
• New Zealand Government Health site
• World Health Organisation site

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