Epidemiologists and health policy experts have joined the call for a COVID-19 memorial, arguing that having a place of remembrance would help Australia reflect on and learn from the pandemic.
It comes after disability advocates launched an appeal for a national memorial and minute’s silence in all Australian parliaments for those who died from the virus.
More than 15,000 Australians have died from COVID so far — nearly double those killed by HIV/AIDS — with concerns that the death rate will continue to rise as new strains circulate and restrictions are removed.
Deakin University epidemiology chair Professor Catherine Bennett said it would be the first time there was a dedicated national monument to an infectious disease. There are living memorials to HIV/AIDS victims, but no permanent national monuments.
“We haven’t experienced anything like this when it comes to health in our lifetimes,” she said. “This was a battle against a new human pathogen.
“We want to make sure that we honour those people [killed] and that we are mindful of what happened so that we don’t just pick up and carry on like normal. We need to be really cognisant of the fact that this came with such a human cost … because that’s our motivation to make sure we learn as much as we can from this.”
Bennett was not sure a physical national memorial was what was needed, but some form of commemoration would be a good idea — provided it was helpful to those who had survived and didn’t send the message that the pandemic had ended: “I wouldn’t want a memorial if the very presence of a memorial made people think it was over.”
Former Labor adviser, strategic health policy consultant and UNSW Adjunct Professor Bill Bowtell said now was the time to establish some form of memorial.
“I certainly reject the idea that somehow people dying from COVID-19 is the inevitable collateral damage of running a neoliberal economic system,” he said.
“There is a proper way to commemorate those people that have died, be it a physical memorial or something else. There should be a moment to reflect on the greatest sacrifice that those people have made, and often in very distressing circumstances.”
He said those who died in the early days of the pandemic in understaffed and ill-equipped aged care homes deserved to have their poor treatment recognised. The memorial should happen while the virus was still claiming lives.
“Their deaths became a factor in motivating people to do all the things that were necessary to bring the new infections rates and deaths rates down because they focused people’s attention on the human costs of getting public health policy wrong,” he said.
Dr Bruce Willett, Queensland chair of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, agreed, saying the pandemic was unlike anything the world had seen before, and therefore deserved commemoration.
“There are two pieces of value in it,” he said. “One is the loss and individuals dealing with that loss. It also serves as a reminder for pandemic preparedness. One thing we can be sure of is that it will not be the last pandemic — certainly not in my lifetime.”
Health Minister Mark Butler, NDIS Minister Bill Shorten and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese didn’t respond to Crikey’s request for comment.
