CALD communities left behind

Arguing a potential racial bias

Last Friday the New South Wales premier, Gladys Berejiklian, indicated that “we all need to work together” and that “it is up to all of us” if we want to go back to “normal life”. NSW Police have denied a major operation to stop the spread of COVID-19 across south-west Sydney is targeting multicultural areas.

On one hand, the highly contagious Delta COVID-19 variant is sweeping through several suburbs. Infections are climbing, pushing 6 million people into a three-week lockdown that appears likely to be extended. On the other, cultural leaders claim government rhetoric and a focused police crackdown has divided the community and could make the situation worse.

The actual difficulty in the community

Dr Joseph, who works at Fairfield Hospital as well as her own private clinic, says beating the virus hinges on clear communication rather than focusing on intentional rule-breaking. Over 50 per cent of the population in the three LGAs of concern were not born in Australia, making efforts to reach other language groups crucial.

In Fairfield, the top languages outside English spoken at home include Assyrian/Aramaic, followed by Arabic and Vietnamese. Dr Joseph says on-the-ground efforts to orally translate NSW Health advice into Assyrian have been ongoing on social media and radio platforms.

“Look, there have been mixed messages from the government, and look I don’t blame them, it’s tough on them. But changing the rules week to week — people need time to understand, especially when they’re waiting on someone to translate for them. As health professionals, we ourselves have been confused at various points due to changing information.”

She argues the right health response would have been battling confusing communication — particularly where written and oral communication in one language can differ.

CALD communities need the right and efficient health message

Making the news bulletins consist of news stories, health and safety issues, health department and government information, security and important warnings and multicultural stories. It is important that ensuring there was a consistent flow of reliable information for multicultural communities in many different languages so CALD communities can make informed decisions about the pandemic and ultimately keep communities safe, keep Australia safe and save lives. 

Victorian government has been offering funding to CALD media groups to generate accurate and immediate health updates to CALD communities. One of the biggest multilingual media groups, the NEMBC has been producing daily news bulletins, providing emergency warnings and Explainers in multiple languages to ethnic communities nationally since May 2020 and in Victoria since September 2020. Due to the pandemic community broadcasters have set up home studios and are able to achieve a quick turnaround on news and emergency warnings. The response time to produce audio in language information can be overnight and distributed the next day. 

CALD communities should never be left behind

Obviously, language barriers limit the message getting across. Strongly held cultural and religious practices may also affect adherence to government restrictions. In response to NSW current circumstance and to prevent the possibility of repeating in the future, the government should adequately consider work closely with these communities to limit COVID-19’s spread and harm. Enforcement of government restrictions in high-risk areas will help but, ultimately, we need more creative and targeted community engagement to change behaviour and to limit the COVID-19 spread.