COVID-19
Mr DIMOPOULOS (Oakleigh) (10:04): I would like to offer my sincere thanks to everyone in my community for their efforts over the last few months in defeating the latest COVID outbreak from Sydney. I would especially like to recognise students, staff, parents, family members and friends of St Patrick’s Primary School in Murrumbeena; staff, friends, patrons and the owners of Vanilla Lounge in Oakleigh; and residents of an apartment building in Oakleigh. These are people who have really done it hard in the last couple of months. As we have seen through the latest outbreaks, tens of thousands of people have been required to isolate and, sadly, some people in my community have contracted the virus. We know this is incredibly contagious, but I think what is lost sometimes in the messaging about this and the coverage of this is that, like any other virus, you can get it while still doing the right thing. Anyone can catch it, whether you are observant or not in terms of the COVID rules.
We need to remember that these are people. They are not just a random statistic, not just a number on a spreadsheet, not just part of a cluster—they are people. When one person catches the virus in the community we need to recognise the efforts of those who are close contacts and need to isolate, and there are often many thousands of them. The community, my community, understands this and has displayed such loyalty and such support in the most recent outbreak—friends, neighbours, strangers, Facebook pages, local businesses going out of their way to make sure that support was offered to those in isolation. Again, thank you to my community. You have gone above and beyond again, and we see low case numbers every day because of you.