News
The state’s anti-corruption watchdog this week met with senior SA Health bureaucrats, including CEO Chris McGowan, as the troubled agency attempts to overturn a culture found to be “riddled with maladministration”.
News
Health authorities are “quietly confident” they have the Parafield cluster “bagged up” – but they still have “no operating hypothesis” as to how COVID-19 breached South Australia’s medi-hotel regime, says SA Health CEO Chris McGowan. He spoke to InDaily’s Tom Richardson about recent events, future fears – and the art of “building the plane while flying it”, as authorities continue to learn more about the coronavirus.
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Health authorities have conceded details about how SA’s COVID cluster spread to a pizza bar in Woodville – sparking a statewide lockdown – remain secret, with SA Health’s CEO disputing that the virus was spread via medi-hotel workers holding multiple jobs.
The Women’s and Children’s Hospital had “ready access” to a paediatric cardiac surgery unit in Sydney when four babies died in one month due to a lack of resources in Adelaide, but authorities have refused to reveal why the children weren’t transported as the head of SA Health accused a parliamentary committee of treating the issue as a “soap opera”.
SA Health’s chief executive says he doesn’t know why exemptions were swiftly granted for 11 Victorian relatives of Port Adelaide Football Club players to travel into South Australia for an AFL game while others seeking permission on compassionate grounds were rejected, as the Opposition calls for an independent inquiry into the scandal.
The chief executive of SA Health says it is “a bit of a mystery” why he has been directed to undertake conflict of interest training, arguing there is nothing substantially wrong with how he has engaged with former employer Silver Chain in his public role.
The Premier’s office gave its positive spin on the report into the SA Health chief executive, dropped on Saturday of the Australia Day long weekend. The report, released later, suggests Dr Chris McGowan breached a public sector Act, but does not recommend his dismissal.
