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Coronavirus Outbreak in Your Workplace, What Would You Do?

by | Thu, Mar 5 2020

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Coronavirus in office
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An uproar has erupted over the outbreak of Coronavirus in an aged Baptist Care facility in Sydney.

The state and federal government hadn’t worked out the funding details in the delivery of the emergency support.  So, the staff all called in sick rather than work in a highly compromised environment while bureaucrats work out who will pay for the extra care.

Charles Newington from Family Voice Australia spoke on this issue with Neil Johnson on Vision Christian Radio’s 20Twenty program.  Listen to their full conversation in the podcast below.

This sort of action by the employees says to the government “get your act together”, Charles said in response to the crisis.  “They’re real people in real situations.  It looks like a somewhat selfish action, but you can see when values start to change, people start to use other ways of levering the government or whoever to get results.”

We may also say that the crises Australia has been through recently – droughts, fires and floods, then pandemic strike at the core of our political culture.

“We’re in that kind of time, where society is full of these kind of tension points.  All it takes is a bit of crisis to really ramp up the pressure and we get the kind of social reactions that really push what we might call ‘social order’ to straining point.”

Australians have responded to the fear of a Coronavirus outbreak by panic buying basic supplies like toilet paper and tissues, leaving supermarket shelves bare. 

Toilet paper shortage

The spread of the Coronavirus could get much more serious than just one facility, so whose responsibly is it to fix and protect us from every pandemic and crisis.

Some with left leaning ideologies believe that government should fix everything. That’s why we pay our taxes and elect them. On the conservative side, people much prefer small government that is not over-regulating everything and stays out of our private lives.

When trouble comes, this means civil society is the first line of defence. We fix our own fences when the flood sweeps them away and rebuild our own sheds when the fire turns them to ash.

The reality is we need a decent balance of government intervention and private responsibility. Charles says, “I certainly don’t want the education department assuming the right to indoctrinate my children or grandchildren with their social values, but I am grateful when they train maths teachers well and develop good school facilities.”

It raises the issue that medical staff are on the front line in an epidemic and what is problematic about Coronavirus is that it is highly infectious and transferable in typical social settings. It may have seemed overkill to everyday Australians that medical staff in China wore such extensive protective clothing, but now we are facing the same risk to our local medicos and care givers.

Charles Newington
Charles Newington of Family Voice Australia

The vast majority (98%) of those who contract Coronavirus recover but we have to learn really quickly that every one of us must conduct ourselves as if we might be a carrier, without getting overwhelmed by anxiety.

The basics of protecting yourself and those around you begins with basic hygiene: – cough and sneeze with care as much for the peace of mind of others, wash  hands regularly and avoid close contact with others – hands shakes, hugs, public spaces.  Know the symptoms of Coronavirus but as the Bible says in 2 Timothy 1:7 (NKJV), “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”

Listen to Neil’s full conversation with Charles Newington in the podcast below.

Tune into 20Twenty and join the conversation with Neil Johnson, weekdays on Vision Christian Radio. Click here for your local times.

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