War on the unvaccinated turns Kafkaesque

Queensland Psychologists, along with all the State’s other private healthcare workers, including chiropractors, physios, private health clinics, general practitioners, private nurse offices, consulting offices, pharmacists, private pathology centres, have until Wednesday, 15 December, to get “fully vaccinated”, or be sacked. A number of them contacted their industry body, the Australian Psychological Society (APS) ‘for clarification’, hoping they would still be allowed to help clients from home using Telehealth. No such luck…

APS emailed its members yesterday, and said that the Government had flat out refused to even consider this request. APS said the Government’s position was that all psychologists MUST BE fully jabbed, even if the ‘consultation’ was through the Telehealth service.

So regardless of whether they are helping clients in the same room or s on the other side of the State, psychologists must provide proof that they are “fully vaccinated” after the 15th or they will be terminated. Which, of course, makes absolutely no epidemiological sense whatsoever.

The news is a massive blow to those psychologists desperately worried about the well-being of their patients. This absurd ruling will now almost certainly put the lives of many Queenslanders, particularly our youth in regional areas, at risk. It also reveals just how far our so-called leaders are prepared to go to achieve their ends.

Already, the mental health toll in Queensland has reached ‘code red’ levels throughout the State. In Brisbane, new patients are waiting up to nine months to get an appointment with a psychologist. The situation is even worse in regional towns, where new patients are reportedly waiting up to 12 months for a spot.

One psychologist told me this week that suicides have been rampant throughout Queensland in 2021, with young people most at risk. The whole industry is seeing a tsunami of people suffering from virtually all forms of trauma, including cognitive decline, sleeping/eating disorders, mental breakdowns and chronic feelings of isolation, powerlessness and despair. The loss of even a few of these highly trained mental health specialists will send many of these people over the edge.

APS commented that the government’s ruling raises many questions around “duty of care and how a psychologist can ethically terminate that relationship”.

It’s an interesting point. It also raises the issue of exactly what role the Government’s OWN ‘duty of care’ plays in all this. Any ‘normal’ government, would have paused long ago to reflect on all the ‘collateral damage’ and social harms their policies were causing within the populace.

Not this one though. In fact, it has been this absolutely stunning lack of empathy or human compassion from any of them, that has been the most shocking part of this whole fiasco.