Aspen Medical chief executive Glenn Keys has defended the company’s qualifications to coordinate Australia’s response to the West Africa Ebola crisis.
The Canberra-based healthcare provider will provide training to health professionals after being hired by the Government to establish a 100-bed Ebola treatment unit in Sierra Leone.
The company has faced criticism over their ability to manage Australia’s response to the outbreak after securing the contract on Wednesday.
Questions have also been raised as to why Australian Medical Assistance Teams, or AUSMATs, were not part of the country’s Ebola response in Africa.
Speaking to the ABC’s Lateline program, Mr Keys said it was his company’s experience in West Africa and ongoing relationship with the Government that secured them the tenure.
“The Government was canvassing options around a range of areas. We provided some briefings, and some material, as I know a lot of other companies did, and then we were approached just earlier this week,” he said.
“We’ve got a long history in supporting the Government, but part of our briefing … was also to let them know that we were in north-west Africa already, and we had a clinic in Liberia, and so we had a good understanding of the local environment.”
Greens senator Richard Di Natale who is himself a former public health specialist has questioned Aspen Medical’s expertise for the assignment.
But Mr Keys said the company had vast experience offering international medical services.
“We have been working for the Australian Government for quite a long time on a range of projects, everywhere from supporting Defence in the Solomon Islands and the Federal Police in Timor, through to providing training before people go into Afghanistan, through to supporting Customs and the Department of Health.”
Aspen Medical will provide ‘gold standard’ care
Mr Keys said he believed that the key to containing the contagion was collaboration.
“We will be working really, really closely with MSF [Medecins Sans Frontieres], the WHO [World Health Organisation], Save the Children, as well as the various governments of Britain, Sierra Leone and Australia,” he said.
Aspen Medical will be financially supported by the Australian Government, and Mr Keys said other organisations as well as the British Government will provide logistical back-up.
“I don’t think we’re going in there operating on our own. We are going to be using all of the experience, including that of the MSF and the WHO.”
Mr Keys said the company would provide “great” on-the-ground training for stationed Australian health professionals.
“It’s based around MSF… Medecins Sans Frontieres is really setting the gold standard there.
“The training program is three days of theory and then seven days working closely monitored inside an ETU [Ebola treatment unit). That’s the gold standard and that’s what we will be delivering.”
Mr Keys said they had strict protocols in place to protect all workers from catching the virus.
“We are very, very strict around infection control procedures. We have a fever clinic which we put at the front of our facility, where we test everybody.”