Extra financial support for Pacific families and communities will go towards increasing the resourcing and capacity of those working on the frontline.
Photo: RNZ Pacific / Sela Jane Hopgood
Associate Health Minister Jenny Salesa announced this week $19.5 million to support by 'Pacific for Pacific' health providers and the Auckland District Health Boards, in particular Counties Manukau (CMDHB).
The second outbreak of Covid-19 is mainly in the Auckland region, where more than two-thirds of New Zealand's Pacific population live.
"The proximity and connection of this outbreak to Pacific communities has required an urgent and a locally targeted response alongside our national strategy," Salesa said.
"Seventy-five of the cases in Auckland are from Pacific families, that is a lot in our community."
In April, the government put $17m towards helping Pacific communities during the pandemic.
The funding supported Pacific health and disability services, public health messaging in Pacific languages, and a new programme linking high-risk Pacific people with important services.
However, due to surge of Pacific people getting tested and being affected by the virus, the funding "ran out" Salesa said.
Photo: RNZ
"The extra funding announced this week will go towards expanding the mobile outreach service, which is made up of a GP and health workers.
"Instead of waiting for people to come in and get tested, they go out to reach families and not only test for Covid-19, but test for everything that the families are needing as well as providing that wraparound support," she said.
"What has happened with this second resurgence is that there were three mobile units at a time, and it wasn't that adequate because the demand for the services was so high.
"What CMDHB did is doubled it to six mobile services, and the funding in April was supposed to last for six months ran out because they weren't expecting to have such a surge in cases," she said.
The funding will also go to a specialised mobile unit at the contact tracing centre and is expected to fund a Pacific model, where the team will not only have Pacific clinicians, but also Pacific people as contact tracers.
"When you are dealing with Pacific people during this pandemic, it is important to have contact tracers who can speak the language to help get as much information as we can from them," she said.
"This package not only ensures those on the frontline have the capacity, support and resources they need to meet the current challenge, it also ensures we continue to be prepared to respond rapidly and effectively to any future instances of community outbreak."
Photo: RNZ / Dan Cook
The funding will be used to deliver on five key priority areas, with an emphasis on increasing the outreach and support to Pacific communities:
- 1) Enabling Pacific health and disability service providers in Auckland to meet the increased demand for their testing and wraparound support services
- 2) Enabling Auckland metro DHBs (led by Counties Manukau) to sustain and expand their mobile outreach services and Pacific case management model (which now includes pathways for working with churches) that was established under the initial Pacific Response Package
- 3) Establishing an enhanced Pacific priority outreach service as part of the National Close Contact Service (NCCS). This will be a specialised, priority mobile service which can be deployed to find, spot-test, and provide wraparound assessments for Pacific close contacts which cannot be traced through the main NCCS processes
- 4) Bringing together a group of leading Pacific researchers and health care providers to analyse current intelligence and data on the Pacific experience of Covid-19, and use this to inform current and future policy and service delivery
- 5) Establishing a flexible pool of funding to assist disability support services and their Pacific Covid-19 response