ACT health officials obscured COVID-19 information during Omicron wave

Documents released to The Canberra Times have revealed that during January's Omicron wave decision makers within ACT Health did not want Canberrans to see the kind of detail about vaccine status and underlying health conditions regularly provided in other states.

They withheld information because of unspecified privacy reasons, but said publicly it was because they didn't "routinely collect that data".

Internal emails, released under freedom of information laws, show that during the worst period for deaths in the pandemic, ACT health officials were concerned about the public misinterpreting data and so kept these and other facts secret. This even included information Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith wanted to know. ACT Health on Tuesday insisted its public explanation for withholding the data was true.

Emails showed that the decision around not releasing comorbidity data was due to patient confidentiality.

"These numbers are very small so no trends can be identified... to preserve patient confidentiality we are not reporting underlying medical conditions which are an important part of the picture," an ACT Health bureaucrat wrote in an email.

Another bureaucrat wrote that: "I do not believe you can make any inferences about lack of boosters and subsequent death. Comorbidities are much more likely to have an effect."

An ACT Health spokesman said on Tuesday it was true that data around underlying health conditions was not routinely collected but the directorate did hold information about underlying health conditions. He said this could not be released due to patient confidentiality.

"Individual patient details may be discussed between public health and treating teams as part of the operational response, including to support identification of individuals to prioritise for additional support, or as part of outbreak response with aged care or disability settings," the spokesman said.

"Thus, where ACT Health cannot report comorbidity data at a system level, ACT Health does hold some specific patient information which cannot be reported publicly for privacy reasons."

This is despite the fact that no personal information was requested.

The email correspondence relating to a media inquiry from The Canberra Times also reveals:

Emails showed Ms Stephen-Smith wanted to provide information that a number of people who died with COVID-19 were in palliative care but ACT chief health officer Kerryn Coleman did not want this included.

Advisers from Ms Stephen-Smith's office had wanted to include this line in the response: "Of those who have died in 2022, a number were already undergoing palliative care at the time of their death".

But health bureaucrats said they could not definitively confirm this was the case as there was no data collected on this. Bureaucrats said the information was anecdotal.

"While we have some anecdotal information on this, we cannot back it up with data. As such if we are asked to clarify the numbers, we will not be able to do so," an official from the chief health officer's office said.

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Dr Coleman also presented concerns about the data being interpreted in a certain way by the public as justification for not including this comment.

"We cannot back up with evidence any comment we make about palliative care in our deaths as don't routinely collect that data, risk of being seen callous or similar to commenting on it particularly if we cannot back it up... if framed as not unexpected in this group with age and underlying comorbidities reflect susceptibility rather than its not unexpected because they are dying anyway," Dr Coleman said in an email.

The ACT Health spokesman said data about palliative care was not collected because it was not part of nationally agreed surveillance definitions for deaths associated with COVID-19. The spokesman also said palliative care was not the same as end-of-life care and there were many reasons somebody could be receiving palliative care.

Dr Coleman was closely involved in the drafting of the media statement provided to The Canberra Times, despite claims a heavy workload had prevented her from attending press conferences.

Health authorities were also hesitant to reveal that one person who had died had received a booster shot.

"Only one has had a booster shot and it would be preferable not to identify," a health official said.

Instead, authorities were going to include a category called "fully vaccinated/ booster". This was at a time when ACT government ministers had publicly aired concerns about a low booster uptake.

A person from ACT Health's communication team fought for the information to be released.

"I think it's extremely relevant to include. Hopefully a bit of public reporting on the fact that nine out of the 10 [sic] deaths had not received a booster might help encourage uptake in booster bookings given these have been flatlining a bit," the communications official said.

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