Paul Kelly addresses question about how long Australian Covid patients should stay home from work

Australia’s top doctor says those affected by Covid-19 are still not allowed to go to work while having symptoms, despite the abolition of mandatory isolation rules across the country.

The country’s national cabinet met on Friday, where Prime Ministers, Prime Ministers and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese agreed to scrap mandatory Covid-19 isolation rules from October 14.

Isolation rules will continue to apply to aged care and hospital workers affected by Covid, but the decision on how long they will stay away from the workplace will now be decided by most Australians themselves.

During a press conference, Seven News reporter Mark Riley pointed out that the removal of the isolation rules did not give Australians clarity on how long they should be away from work.

“How do they stay away now—five days, seven days, three days, one day?” he asked.

Paul Kelly, the Chief Medical Officer, said workplaces should not treat Covid-19 differently than they have for the past two and a half years.

Professor Kelly pointed to a letter he wrote to Mr Albanian, in which he said he strongly encouraged Australians with “respiratory disease, and especially those with confirmed Covid, to stay at home and, above all, to avoid high-risk situations while they be symptomatic’.

He told reporters in Canberra: ‘We have not changed the contagiousness of this virus. The contagious period, we know, the average is two to three days is the peak contagiousness.

“Again, it would be, if someone has symptoms, they’re more likely to be contagious.”

dr. However, Kelly said the government would not stop contagious people from entering the community now. And we won’t be in the future either.’

‘As for the professional elements, in those particularly risky settings, that remains a discussion with employers.

‘Arbo elements apply to all kinds of infectious diseases, that’s how you should also view Covid.’

Australia is the latest country to join other countries around the world that have ditched Covid isolation measures, including the UK and Switzerland.

“We want to have measures that are proportionate and targeted,” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said.

Pandemic disaster leave payments will also be canceled on the same date, with the exception of people in high risk settings.

“We want to continue to promote vaccinations as absolutely crucial, including people getting booster shots,” Mr Albanese said.

‘And we want a policy that promotes resilience and capacity building and reduces dependence on government intervention.’

Professor Kelly warned that scrapping the isolation rules was not an indication that the pandemic was ‘over’.

“It recognizes that we are in a very low transmission phase of the pandemic here in Australia,” he said.

“It in no way suggests that the pandemic is over. We will almost certainly see future peaks of the virus in the future, as we saw earlier this year.

“However, at the moment we have very low rates of both cases, hospitalizations, intensive care admissions, elderly care outbreaks and several other measures that we have followed very closely in our weekly open report.”

“However, now is a time to consider that we have other things we can do to protect those most vulnerable people, and that is absolutely our main goal.”

Mr Albanese dismissed concerns that scrapping isolation rules and pandemic disaster payments would encourage infected workers to return to the office.

“It’s time to move away from the Covid exception, in my opinion, and think about what we need to do to protect people from respiratory diseases,” he said.

The change follows pressure from NSW Prime Minister Dominic Perrottet to abolish the long-standing rules.

Currently, Australians in all states and territories are required to isolate for five days if they test positive for Covid-19.

“We have to get to a point where when you’re sick you stay at home and when you’re healthy you go out and enjoy life and that’s where we have to go as a country,” Perrottet said.

“We also need to be in a position where people take care of each other, that we take care of each other and make sure that if you are sick you stay at home without there being a public health measure.”

Australian Medical Association president Dr Steve Robson warned against the move on ABC News Breakfast.

dr. Robson said, “I think people who are pushing for the isolation periods to be abolished are not scientifically literate and put the public at risk and they need to understand that.”

“We are seeing another huge increase in the number of COVID cases. It comes in the holiday season when people would travel around the world.

“It is a period of significant risk and we urge caution as we need to protect the health system.”

Victorian Prime Minister Daniel Andrews said COVID should be normalized as a virus and treated like any other respiratory disease.

Meanwhile, ACT chief minister Andrew Barr said that while the number of cases fell, caution was advised.

“Right now there is a period of low case numbers, low hospital admissions, low levels of community transmission, it’s unlikely it will be a better time than now going into the summer,” he told reporters.

“But you also have to consider what may come.”