Page 3374 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 19 August 2009
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There was also another unfortunate complication, which was the impact on the funeral. Because of the lack of information and the misinformation surrounding this case, there were people who were afraid to attend Katie Sewell’s father’s funeral because of fears of contracting the virus. That caused undue pain and, in her words, it stopped the grieving process. She said:
It’s completely stopped our grieving process and put it on hold.
Attempts were made by ACT Health throughout this process to pass information to the family and to deal with the process. It just seems to have gone wrong in this case. The family had a meeting with six officials who discussed the issue with the family some time after the father’s death. The family has actually described the meeting as political and have said:
This situation has left family members feeling as though Dad was simply a number and no respect was given to him; and that we as his family and individuals were treated similarly without respect or acknowledgement.
So the process seems to have been one which has been mishandled from a communication point of view leading up to this weekend when the family were advised that there would no public apology. Shortly after being provided that advice, there was a public apology, but the family were given no forewarning that that would made. I read again from the family directly:
This bandaid apology was indicative of the insincere correspondence and handling of our father’s death. The apology that appeared on the ABC News was done without any correspondence or personal interaction by ACT Health and our family. Without being aware of the apology, family members who usually watch ABC news were confronted on seeing the apology without the opportunity of being previously warned or even having the apology personally delivered prior to the news bulletin. This lack of consideration grieving families who may have lost someone in normal circumstances let alone one that is under such national and world wide focus was hard to deal with in the fashion ACT Health has delivered.
Further:
Family members who watched the apology felt—like the written apologies—he did not adequately address our family’s concerns … Therefore, in our minds, the existing apologies did not come remotely close to actually saying sorry.
The family is also concerned that what appears to have occurred is that, instead of a genuine response and attempt to address the family’s needs and to listen to them and understand their concerns, there was a blame game over who had leaked the information. Again, in the words of Katie Sewell, Mr Johns’s daughter:
We are disappointed that rather than seeking to address our concerns and our hurt, the government agencies are still playing the blame game over who leaked this to the media.
This is particularly disappointing given that a similar situation related to the first swine flu death in Australia. It seems that some of the lessons that could have been learned in that situation have not been.
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