An Aboriginal health care provider based in far west New South Wales has slammed the public health response to Wilcannia's COVID-19 outbreak in a scathing submission to a parliamentary inquiry into regional and rural health.
Giving evidence at the inquiry, Maari Ma Aboriginal Health Corporation CEO Bob Davis cited a "lack of respect" by the Far West Local Health District (LHD) and other services that assisted during the Wilcannia outbreak.
Mr Davis told the inquiry committee it should have been Maari Ma leading the COVID response on the ground, not the health district or the Royal Flying Doctor Service.
"If you go back in time, we should have been the lead role in delivering the rollout of COVID vaccines in Wilcannia," he said.
"We're the biggest primary health care provider in the town and it's a majority Aboriginal population.
Vaccination rates in Wilcannia are now among the lowest in the state, with just 70 per cent of the population fully immunised.
LHD defends Wilcannia COVID response
Far West LHD CEO Umit Agis defended the district's response to the COVID-19 outbreak in Wilcannia, alluding to the zero-death toll as the measure of its success.
"The success of Wilcannia was largely based on the partnership that we had with Maari Ma and RFDS," he said.
Mr Agis said the COVID response also contended with "individuals who are reluctant to have a vaccination".
" In fact, if you take them out of the picture the (vaccination rate) is more likely to be in the mid to high 80s," he said.
The LHD invests $2.2million into Maari Ma annually.
Mr Agis told the inquiry the remoteness of the far West LHD – which spans 195,000 kilometres with population of just 31,000 people — was the biggest challenge of providing accessible and timely health services to the region.
Wilcannia calls for more mental health services
Witnesses from Wilcannia told the inquiry the LHD had lost the community's trust and respect, citing a desperate need for more mental health services.
"None of the services stepped up for mental health during the COVID outbreak," said community leader Monica Kerwin.
"(Far West) Health asked positive patients how they were feeling but it was more so to the symptoms they were asking, not the mental health side of it.
Ms Kerwin, who lost her 34-year-old son to suicide, said services would often palm off patients to other services, prompting confusion on where to go for assistance.
"If there were more mental health workers in the community, my son wouldn't have died the way he died," she said.
She highlighted the call for more locally based mental health services that could live in community and gain the trust and respect of locals.
"It's not about the confidentiality, it's about the community's trust, we need councillors to live in our community that can build the relationship with the people, not three days a week."
Mr Agis admitted more could be done to address and improve Wilcannia's alarmingly high suicide rate.
"This year we opened up a safe haven café in Broken Hill and also invested heavily in community education right across the district around suicide prevention."
"We will be looking to both communicate what is available and invest in the gaps that communities have spoken about."
Access to transport 'culturally unsafe'
According to Maari Ma's submission, Mr Davis said a lack of transport to health centres is one of the single largest barriers to timely and appropriate care.
"The current transport assistance program is grossly inadequate, under-utilised by Aboriginal people, poorly administered and culturally unsafe," it said.
It also said the "disinvestment" of primary health networks by the LHD had been a result of a "closed system" with a "clinical superiority complex."
Mr Davis declined to provide further comment on these statements.
The NSW Parliamentary inquiry is examining health outcomes and access to health for people in regional and remote New South Wales.
